Extracts by Mclean Stephenson
Sydney photographer, Mclean Stephenson’s latest solo exhibition, at Black Eye Gallery in Sydney, will coincide with the release of his photo book, Extracts. The exhibition runs 28 July to 16 August. Extracts explores the last six years of Stephenson’s photography. Shooting selectively on a variety of film formats, and taking a more hands-on approach toward his medium, Stephenson invites his viewers to see the disturbances and physical transformations that take place in the creation of the images. Through the scratches, cuts, and faces blurred in movement, he makes his presence known.
His work recalls that of Francis Bacon who stated, “I would like my pictures to look as if a human being had passed between them, like a snail, leaving a trail of the human presence and memory trace of past events, as the snail leaves its slime.” However, unlike Bacon’s more profound representation of violence and screams of existential terror, Stephenson prefers a more quiet sense of disruption in his exploration of darkness - a whisper, not a scream.
Without settling into a single style, Stephenson varies his subjects. Travelling from remote Australia to Eastern Europe, his approach ranges from formal precision to showcasing the disfigured marks that result when his images are left to chance. Still, some consistencies appear through the years of work. When looking closely, one can find Stephenson’s attraction to transgression and privacy as well as otherness, intimacy and dissociation. McLean Stephenson has been working as a photographer since 2009 and is well known in the music industry, working with such performers as Alex Cameron, PVT, Megan Washington, Isabella Manfredi and Jack Ladder.
- Organised by: Black Eye Gallery
- Phone: (02) 8084 7541
- Email: info@blackeyegallery.com.au
