Over the last ten years, dissatisfied with the often complacent values of the photography world, Clare Strand has assembled a body of work that is both subversive and celebratory in its approach to photographic conventions.
During this period Clare Strand’s art has developed through a series of increasingly interesting and unique projects that have explored various photographic genres, from Victorian portraiture to crime scene and forensic photography. In these series she has dwelt on the oddity of photography’s strange backwaters, its utilitarian functions and its infiltration of every corner of our lives, to make us question the value and complex meanings of photographic images. This might be simply quirky and strange, but in Strand’s work it is resolved through photographs of incredible quality and genuine originality.
In our photographically saturated times, Strand’s work remains distinctively new and difficult to place, and yet it is also uncannily familiar, drawing heavily on the genres she investigates. In recent years she has consistently worked in black and white and has exploited the traditional qualities of the fine print to startling effect. It is the wit, the irony and perverse logic of these formidable black and white series, with their continued clashing and mixing up of photographic ideas and sources, that has won her an international reputation.
This comprehensive survey of Strand’s practice is the sixth book in the Photoworks Monograph series and is available to purchase in the online Shop.
Buy Clare Strand – A Photoworks Monograph