Annette Kelm

Annette Kelm’s photographs are influenced by still life, advertising and magazine photography, and silent-era Hollywood movies. Meticulously staged, the photographs often have the appearance of hyper-realistic paintings. Within these still life photographs, mundane objects are isolated and removed from their signification and functionality within the still life scenography, rendering them as purely visual forms comprising purely colour and shape. The work serves to address the overlapping realms of consumerism, capitalism and art, and the way in which the medium of photography has historically been complicit in blurring these categories. Formally, Kelm takes reference from Hollywood techniques such as ‘day for night’ – in which camera exposures are altered to make footage shot in the day appear as if shot at night – to create scenes that may be more consciously constructed than they initially appear. ...