Karen Hymer was chosen as one of the Photographers of Merit by Jill Enfield in this years Denis Roussel Award.
Age & Seduction is a group of hand-worked photopolymer gravures that explore the relationship between the aging human body and natural elements. I grew up in the desert collecting dead animals, dried plants and rocks. This landscape has inspired me to seek relationships between the transformation of my own aging body and the processes of decay in the natural world. I turn my camera on myself and others my age in an attempt to find beauty in the aging body. I have also been influenced by the cookbook Aphrodite: A Memoir of the Sensesby Isabel Allende. My images pair the body with foods believed to be aphrodisiacs. Allende states that food, like eroticism starts with the eyes. My eyes are drawn to fruits and vegetables past their prime and to bodies that display the evidence of age. Combining photography with printmaking I emphasize the interplay of texture, pattern, light and shadow, working with the muted earth tones I associate with growing up in the desert. These visual “remnants”—decontextualized close-ups of the human body and remains of plants and animals—reveal the subtle poetry of aging and decay and invite the viewer to see beauty in unexpected places.
To learn more about the work of Karen Hymer please visit her page at Karen Hymer.
Featured Comments:
“The work in today’s post deserves a big WOW! The imagery is fantastic – strong, beautifully done, richly meaningful, distinctive. Thanks for introducing me to another wonderful artist!! ” Barbara Bullock – Wilson
These are fabulous. Thank you for sharing!