Lost Domain
Drifting in New York, and a few other places. A getting-the-feet-back-on-the-ground effort.
Don't stay someplace too long, unless you are going to stay there forever.
For Immediate Release:
Dan Torop - Lost Domain November 12 - December 21, 2002 Opening Reception: Thursday, November 14, 6 - 8 pm
Derek Eller Gallery is pleased to present new photographs by Dan Torop.
Dan Torop's Lost Domain, takes its title from Alain-Fournier's The Wanderer, an early 20th century description of quixotic youth pursuing lost purity. Models for his project include Koudelka's Exiles, from which he takes the stance of the wandering photographer trying to make sense of fleeting world with the simple but accurate tools. Using a minimum of equipment (35 mm camera, sometimes flash or tripod), his working method has been to drift within the world and filter/record perceptions which are at a level of meaning/resonance. This exhibition includes images of a fake bird, a real swan, pictures at dawn/dusk, foliage, a self-portrait, people, parties, a misty curve on the highway, and a glut of fireflies.
Dan Torop's work has been seen in numerous exhibitions. This will be his first show with the gallery.
Here are some quotes from The Wanderer:
"Without becoming abstract, my style must make do with a single image if that image can hold a world for the perceptive."
"I like the marvelous only when it is strictly enveloped in reality."
"My task is to tell my own stories, only my own, with my own memories, to write nothing but poetic autobiography; to create a world, to interest people in very personal memories – for all that, the memories that make my deepest being what it is."
"I believe only in life as a river, and all I want to be are its waves."
"Perhaps my novel will be a perpetual coming and going between dream and reality."
"My credo in art is childhood. The thing is to render it without childishness."
Here's the draft for the press release:
Lost Domain
Models for the project include Koudelka's Exiles, from which I took the stance of the wandering photographer trying to make sense of fleeting world with the simple but accurate tools. My working method has been to drift within the world and filter/record perceptions which are at a level of meaning/resonance. I'm using the minimum of eqpt. (35 mm camera, sometimes flash or tripod), and intervening only when necessary.
An analogy to working method is fisherman w/a number of lines set out, some baited for moonlit landsacpes, some for people in their better moments. Wait for tug, pull in the fish if I can. Fry it up if it is healthy.
At times there is a necessity to make a particular sort of image (I'm particularly sad), at times there is an opportunity (a misty curve on the highway, a glut of fireflies).
I'm working w/some of my familiary imagery (fake birds, real swans, dawn/sunset, foliage, self) as well as bringing in people and parties.
The show title is from Alain-Fournier's The Wanderer, an early 20th cent. description of quixotic/romantic youth pursuing lost purity.
(This is a project to verify/elucidate beauty/love by truth and/or not-truthof chemical/optical/mechanical examination.)