David Benjamin Sherry: Mother
September 19th, 2023
In the realm of contemporary photography, David Benjamin Sherry stands out for his subversive take on the traditional, with an artistic style underpinned by fervent political advocacy. His photographic oeuvre, rooted in the ever-evolving landscapes of the Western United States, transcends conventional boundaries to redefine the expected narratives within visual storytelling.
Sherry challenges the deeply ingrained colonialist narrative that has often cast the American West as a symbol of individualism, characterized by rigid straightness, whiteness, and maleness. Instead, he paints a more inclusive and compassionate portrait of the region, one that seeks to elevate the discourse surrounding its preservation. Sherry's work, characterized by vivid colors saturating each frame, breathes new life into the iconic landscapes of America's national parks, offering viewers a transformative perspective.
Embracing the traditions of renowned American landscape photographers from the past, Sherry wields a wooden-framed 8 x 10 inch large format camera as his instrument of choice. His artistry lies not only in the visual compositions he creates but also in the profound dialogue he fosters around issues of identity and environmental consciousness. By merging the grandeur of large-format landscape photography with contemporary inquiries into identity and representation, Sherry forges a powerful connection between his images and the pressing concerns of our time. Through his distinctive darkroom process, he conjures vibrant monochromatic washes that envelop each photograph, imbuing them with an ethereal, almost otherworldly quality.
Winter Morning Fog, Bridevail Falls, Yosemite, California, 2013. Image courtesy of Huxley-Parlour
Sherry's latest exhibition, Mother, opening September 20th at HUXLEY-PARLOR, London, provides a poignant window into his deeply personal journey of climate grief, a journey that mirrors the Earth's own struggles. It is within the heart of the American West, specifically California, Utah, and New Mexico, that Sherry creates his striking visual narratives. His lens captures the diverse tapestry of these lands, from the majestic peaks of Yosemite Valley to the stark beauty of Joshua Tree, traversing the highest mountains of California to the lowest deserts on Earth. In a world grappling with the profound urgency of ecological preservation, Sherry's photography emerges as a powerful tool for seeing, understanding, and communing with our sacred landscapes in profound and provocative ways.
Below, we caught up with David to delve deeper into his photographic vision, exploring how his masterful interplay of color, form, and scale unlocks the hidden potentialities of the ecological and the queer. As we stand at a critical juncture in our relationship with the natural world, Sherry’s work offers a luminous path toward a more empathetic and sublime connection with our environment. His photographs serve as a testament to the ever-pressing need to reconnect with the landscapes and ecosystems that sustain us, offering a profound reminder of the transformative power of art and the boundless possibilities it holds for our shared future.
Joshua Tree II, Gold Butte National Monument, Nevada, 2019. Image courtesy of Huxley-Parlour
How would you introduce your work to someone who hasn’t seen it before?
I’m a landscape artist and my work is a response to my experiences in the land. My art practice has evolved over the last fifteen years to primarily focus on threatened landscapes of the Western US. In my desire to preserve these lands I’m working in the tradition of large-format landscape photography, but with a revisionist stance that utilizes an unorthodox approach to color and scale to achieve emotional resonance and imbue the image with a more porous identity. As a queer person, I’m interested in challenging the West’s colonialist trope of the rugged individualist to present a much-needed, softer, more inclusive discourse around the region and its preservation.
Sunrise on Mesquite Flat Dunes, Death Valley, California, 2013. Image courtesy of Huxley-Parlour
Valley of the Gods, Bears Ears National Monument, Utah, 2019. Images courtesy of Huxley-Parlour.
There are undeniably political themes you explore through your work. Can you tell us about how you respond to contemporary politics in your photography?
My work explores familiar land and terrain during this unprecedented global shift, which urgently requires replacing the old narrative with something new - queer, eco-feminist, and inclusive. While it's of course useful and effective to present the stakes of the environmental movement through traditional means of documentation, my brightly saturated, large-scale images have the potential to forge a deeper and more poignant connection between the viewer and planet Earth (at least that’s the hope!).
Emotionally, my work is driven by what is often described as climate grief, and through my exhibitions and books, I want to elicit a complex web of emotions for the viewer, like awe, anxiety, hope, and mourning. I believe in the power of art and beauty to complement more straightforward means of environmental activism and reach those who are unmoved by or numb to all the evidence that our planet is at a tipping point - maybe beauty can be an even more effective tool than horror in environmental advocacy work.
With my photographs, the fundamental question framing my thinking is: how can we live harmoniously with this changing world while holding on tightly to what remains?
Jumbo Rocks, Joshua Tree National Park, California, 2023. Image courtesy of Huxley-Parlour
As an openly queer photographer, you talk about your imagery in opposition to the white cis heterosexual masculinity most commonly thought of when discussing the American wilderness, can you talk a little about how you use nature and unpopulated imagery to explore/expose personal identity?
Through the visual language of landscape photography, I’m “queering” the recognizable American landscape not only with my own journey through it but with my unorthodox use of color. As I navigate through the wilderness spaces and rural communities of the West stereotypically considered inhospitable to queer people, my travels have become a tool for processing the American queer experience; queer narrativity is built into both the process and product of the work.
I’m interested in challenging the West’s colonialist trope of the rugged (straight, white, male) individualist to present a much-needed, more inclusive discourse around the region and its preservation. I believe the planet's resource and energy disasters are a result of our capitalistic and colonialist (patriarchal) dominance over Mother Earth.
Our most well-known origin story is gendered, white, and cis – and men continue to dominate and destroy the landscape. There is a correlation between the destruction of the planet and the continued violence against women, people of color and queer people.
White Sands at Dusk, White Sands National Park, New Mexico, 2022. Image courtesy of Huxley-Parlour
Yosemite Falls, Yosemite, California, 2013. Image courtesy of Huxley-Parlour
One of the first things viewers will notice in your work is the boldness of colour, where did this aesthetic come from for you? How do you pick the colours you work with?
I mural-print my photographs with an alternative darkroom process, in which I create a vibrant monochrome wash that veils the image, drawing tonal inspiration from the natural environment to determine the final color. The dramatic size and coloration of the print provide an additional layer of experience to the work, activating the image, enhancing the sensation of sight for the viewer, and inviting them in to find meaning and empathy for these fragile and threatened landscapes.
I first became interested in color through the experimental films of Kenneth Anger. His films felt like spells cast upon the viewer and his use of color was powerful and surreal, the colors often shifted this notion of reality to me. I was intrigued by the filmmakers' authentic documentation on film of people and places – but the use of color felt like a decisive act of artifice, a conceptual gesture, and became transportation. It felt subliminal and is one of the many tropes Anger used to cast his spell, this color inspired me and I also wanted to cast a spell upon my viewer, but with still images.
I first experimented with color filtration using people and body painting, matching humans (often myself) to the landscape, as a means to convey my own deep relationship to the Earth. But in time I just became interested in the landscape, as human interference is what's caused this mess we're in. As soon as the body disappeared from my work, the photographs grew in size and the color became more saturated. The color acts as a vehicle and is also performative, it replaces the old way of looking and thinking about environmentalism and photography, with something new, which I believe is the only way forward – we have to change our relationship to the Earth and my landscape work is about unpacking this idea.
David Benjamin Sherry: Mother is open to view at HUXLEY-PARLOUR (3-5 Swallow Street, London, W1B 4DE), 21 September - 21 October 2023. More information can be found online at www.huxleyparlour.com
Sunset, Sierra Del Carmen Mountains, Rio Grande, Big Bend National Park, Texas, 2020. Image courtesy of Huxley-Parlour
About David Benjamin Sherry
Sherry (born 1981) studied at the Rhode Island School of Design and Visual Art before graduating with an MFA in photography from Yale University in 2007. His work has been the subject of the monographs, It's Time (2010); Quantum Light (2013); Earth Changes (2015); American Monuments (2015) and most recently Pink Genesis (2022).
His photographs have been exhibited at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, PS1 MoMA, New York, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the International Center of Photography, New York, the de Young Museum, San Francisco, CA, Ballroom Marfa, Texas, and the Tucson Museum of Art, Arizona.
His work is held in the permanent collections of The Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Walker Art Centre, Minneapolis, The Saatchi Collection, London, The Alfond Collection of Contemporary Art, Cornell Fine Arts Museum, Florida, and The Marciano Foundation, Los Angeles, CA.
He lives and works in Santa Fe, New Mexico.