The White Whale

See Brian Wehrung’s work in WTP Vol. V #2

dye sublimation print
on aluminum
20″ x 30″

Color, line, geometry. These are the basis of many of the objects that we experience every day. When we look at, say, a building, or an automobile, we are seeing a complex object constructed from these building blocks, and we experience that object within the context of its physical location and as a function of our own experiences. What I try to do with my photographs is break those mental connections with context and experience in order to see the parts instead of the whole. By extracting out some of the details of the whole, and eliminating others, the complexity is reduced, the context is eliminated, and the basic forms are left. A grocery store reduces down to a set of colored rectangles, a sports car reduces down to a series of curved lines. Those commonplace, and many times uninteresting objects, which may barely register on our consciousness, become unique, abstract, geometric puzzles. The parts become more than the whole. I call this process Extractive Reductionism.” —Brian Wehrung