"The poetic element of these images—the abstract subtext of slippery, shifting narrative found in every photograph—is inflated here through the process of subtle manipulation and nuanced sequencing. While offering a world of loss and isolation, the pictures in Alpine Star also suggest the cross-pollination of personal history and collective memory."
Below is an excerpt from an interview with Jude that appears on the Humble Arts website in correlation with the exhibition. You can read this interview in its entirety here.
Julie Fishkin: Does the suspension of narrative that occurs interest you because of the powerful scenes that the re-contextualized images tend to conjure up?
Ron Jude: The suspension of narrative is at the heart of what I love about photography. It occurs naturally most of the time in any photograph, and my job is to finesse these ambiguous narratives, whether they’re in found images or my own, into something that’s coherent, yet still a moving target in terms of meaning. I think this is what you’re describing as the “powerful scenes” that are aroused through this finessing process. However, I’m equally interested in the images that hover right at the edge of utter banality and flatness. Those are the risky pictures, the ones that are operating without the safety net of punch line, irony, or any sort of obvious pictorial device, yet they still find a way to draw you in and hold your attention.
All photographs from the series Alpine Star
All Images © Ron Jude
