Abstract Realities
by Jody Zellen

Publication: ArtPress, 2002
Publisher: -
Published in English
Coinciding with the 2002 exhibition 'Abstract Realities' at the Jan Kesner Gallery, Los Angeles, USA

(...) creating an abstract form of elegantly contrasting colors as he is in faithfully recording his subject. Seen together the images depict the urban environment, but do not describe any individual city. Van der Salm focuses on details. In this new body of work he is interested in windows and entryways. These images are barriers. They reflect the outside blocking our view of the interior spaces. The images collapse space and distort perspective, As abstract surfaces they become disorienting. Its difficult to locate the ground or photographer’s vantage point in the images. One is left to indulge in the surfaces depicted: to marvel at the play of light or the perfect geometry of the building.

"Two-Sixty-Four" [Lisbon, Portugal], 2001 is an image of a flat façade. A grid of windows makes up its surface. Each of the tiny windows reflects a different part of the sky or low down, the landscape. The image becomes a composite of more than 200 small pictures, each depicting a different window reflection. The photograph is a fragment of a much larger whole yet at the same time becomes a microcosm of urban xistence.

There are numerous dualities in Van der Salm’s work: Real vs artificial, sharp vs blurred, inside vs outside. Although each image is the result of a carefully observed and framed reality, the ambiguities that are created add to the content of the work (...)

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