Lucien Alperstein: Every Time

Overview

Any place. Any time. Every Time. Lucien Alperstein's photographs lie on the far side of the line that links realism and abstraction. The images are of everyday things we recognise: a face emerging from a crowd in darkness, a vast chop of waves, a figure between a power line and a roof. But when cropped like this, they take on a potent, far-reaching character.

It is this quality of tight framing that allows the photographer to invest ordinary sights and experiences with a more universal potential. Alperstein says in the show's notes that when taking the photos, "layers of meaning jumped out at me and I felt like I was in the past, like the past was in the present, or that stories are just stories and there is no before or after."

Alperstein refuses to describe the images any more than this; they remain untitled and further abstracted in meaning. They hang in the mind's eye long after seeing them, surely the signal of an effective collection of work. Though still and soundless, there's something distinctly cinematic to them; they bring to mind the strangeness of American suburban nightmare films like American Beauty or the Coen brothers' A Serious Man.

Despite the overwhelming trend toward video, performance and installation in the art world, these photographs — tranquil, contemplative, analogue (yet digitally printed) — show that the desire to create and look at simple, lovely images has not diminished. When treated this sensitively, old school photographs still have the ability to engage and arrest.

If only more spaces in Sydney were willing to freely open their walls to emerging artists as the Tate (above Glebe's Toxteth Hotel) has. The Tate feels like a proper venue, and the art is treated respectfully — not like the decorative visual equivalent of elevator muzak that appears in many bars and cafes. (And by the way, the Toxteth's recent renovation is actually quite nice — when was the last time you saw a pub renovated for the better?) Every Time is one of the Tate's program of weekly shows of new Sydney-based artists, launched just a few months ago, and we're eager to see who else gets unearthed.

Image: Lucien Alperstein.