Description
This catalogue features work from Rachel Herman’s series Imp of Love. The photographs capture moments between two people who were once lovers, but are now trying to maintain their relationship as just friends. According to Herman, she hopes to depict visually “how love bends but doesn’t break.”
This attempt to maintain a friendship where there was once a more intense love can lead to awkward or painful moments, or in some cases tender and confusing interactions between the couples. Many of the images in this exhibition capture affection that is, in the artist’s words, “loaded, layered, complicated, or unrequited.” Yet the couples are willing to endure this discomfort in an attempt to retain a friendship with their former lover, and not cut off contact entirely.
According to Light Work director Hannah Frieser in her gallery statement, “More than anything else, Herman’s photographs force us to contemplate the most basic act of relating to other human beings. People meet, some bond, others part. While this is an everyday occurrence, given the right person this simple incident can hugely impact our life. We meet hundreds of people before we come across the ‘one.’ In this fragile arrangement, it is easy to lose that special someone and for the romance to end, but it is harder yet to keep the other in our lives.”
This catalogue includes an essay by Hannah Frieser.
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Rachel Herman holds an MFA in Visual Arts from The University of Chicago, and a BA in English Literature from the University of Michigan. Her work has been exhibited nationwide, including such galleries as Photographic Center Northwest in Seattle, WA; Dolphin Gallery in Kansas City, MO; Foothills Art Center in Golden, CO; and H.J. Johnson Gallery at Carthage College in Kenosha, WI, among others. She was an Artist-in-Residence at Anderson Ranch in Snowmass, CO, and participated in Review Santa Fe. She is currently an adjunct photography instructor at Columbia College in Chicago; Dominican University in River Forest, IL; and the Evanston Art Center.
