Object number2021.38.18

Untitled, (White # 1)

Date2003-04

Artist Karine Laval (American, b. Paris, born 1971)

CultureAmerican

MediumChromogenic print

EditionEdition 2 of 15

DimensionsImage: 19 3/4 x 19 3/4 in. (50.2 x 50.2 cm)

Credit LineAnonymous gift

On View

Not on view

Period21st c

Classification(s)

Photograph

SignedOn verso, signed lower right in ink: Karine Laval

InscribedOn verso, by artist, lower right in ink: White, Untitled #1, 2004 / [signature] 2/15. On verso, by unknown hand, lower right corner in pencil: FLLAC2021.38.18

ProvenanceBonni Benrubi Gallery

Vassar Exhibitions

Chronostasia: Select Acquisitions 2020–2025

Label TextSnow settles across a surface, obscuring what lies beneath. Only scattered clues reveal the deception: a red door handle, keyhole, frosted glass, not a landscape but a car, its pale blue body concealed by winter. This early image from Karine Laval’s photographs shot in Norway complements her Pool (2002) series and anticipates her subsequent Heterotopia (2014–), explorations of perceptual delay, color, and spatial ambiguity. As Laval has said, “Central to my practice of photography is taking our perceptions of the world and bending or distorting them.” Laval offers us a new way of attending to the world, as an aslant silence resets our encounter with the familiar.

Object information is a work in progress and may be updated as new research findings emerge. To help improve this record, please email loebcollections@vassar.edu