Rose #56, Austin, TX, 2003
16” x 21” (40 x 53.34 cm)
Type C-Print
From an Edition of 10
Yossi Milo Gallery is pleased to announce an exhibition of color photographs by Lise Sarfati from the series The New Life (La Vie Nouvelle). The exhibition will open on October 20 and close on November 26, with a reception and book signing for the artist on Thursday, October 20, from 6 to 8 p.m. This will be Ms. Sarfati's first solo exhibition in the United States.
In 2003, Lise Sarfati journeyed through the United States, photographing young adults in the context of their solitary lives in towns such as Austin, Texas; Berkeley, California; Portland, Oregon; and New Orleans, Louisiana. The photographs dramatize the complex emotional states of mind that lie close beneath the surface of her subjects. With minimal choreography, Sarfati activates connections with her subjects in their everyday spaces and situations - bedrooms, backyards, kitchens, grocery stores.
The charged strangeness of the photographs in The New Life parallels an earlier body of work Sarfati made in Russia during the 1990s. While the geographic, socioeconomic, and political contexts are entirely unique, the suggested narrative of isolation links this body of work with the Russian series. Sarfati avoids nostalgia with respect to her young subjects, identifying instead with their out-of-place feelings.
Lise Sarfati was born in 1958 and grew up in France. She obtained a master's degree in Russian Studies from the Sorbonne in 1979 and took up photography full time in 1986 when she was designated the official photographer for the Acadamie des Beaux Arts in Paris. She received grants from both the Fiacre Ministère de la Culture, Paris, and Villa Médicis Hors les Murs. In 1989, Sarfati moved to Russia, where she photographed almost exclusively until 1998.
Sarfati's work has been exhibited abroad, including solo exhibitions at Domus Artium, Salamanca, Spain; Maison Européenne de la Photographie, Paris, France; The Photographers' Gallery in London, UK; Nicolaj Center of Contemporary Art, Copenhagen, Denmark; and Museo de San Telmo, San Sebastian, Spain. Sarfati is included in a group exhibition entitled Euro Visions: The New Europeans at the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, France, this fall. Her work is included in several public collections, including the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Brooklyn Museum of Art, Fonds National d'Art Contemporain in Paris and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. In 1996, she was awarded the Prix Niepce in Paris and the Infinity Award from ICP in New York. A book entitled The New Life (La Vie Nouvelle) was published by Twin Palms in the fall of 2005. Sarfati currently lives and works in Paris.