|
|
11 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Bleak, beautiful photographs, 30 Mar 2005
In this piece, Larry Clark chronicles the lives of several young adults addicted to amphetamines. The photographs are revealing and shocking, but never voyeuristic, as Clark at the time was 'one of them'. These wonderful photographs, which bathe their subjects in a warm light, are filled with empty stares, which reveal the bleakness of the lives that are depicted.Larry Clark is now a creater of film, and in this work you can see him beginning to lean towards that medium by his occasional use of series of photographs, one of which depicts a young man shooting up, and then in a blurred agony, disturbingly reminiscent of Francis Bacon's paintings. Also depicted in a series is the beating of a police informant. Clark's photographs are completely unjudging and honest, as indeed documentary photography should be. However, this is acheived without disregard for the aesthetic. There appears to be no intent to Clark's work - he doesn't appear to be advising the viewer not to do drugs, but simply offering us a chance to see the world of those whose lives have become orrientated around amphetamines. These are some of the most powerful photographs I have ever seen (perhaps inferior to Goldin's work emotionally, but certainly more beautifully composed photographs), and if you are considering buying this, I urge you to do so. Every page is cold and terrifying, yet irrefutably beautiful...
|