CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. — “Vanity” is one of those words that carries cultural baggage, from the Bible (“All is vanity”) to philosophy (according to Nietzsche, “Vanity is the fear of appearing original”) to literature (Ezra Pound’s “Rally”). Get off your vanity”). In an exhibition of Holly Wright photography at the Fralin Art Museum, the word’s meaning changes from “vanity” to “vanity.”
Holly Wright: “Vanity” It begins with the eponymous photo series, 10 of which are close-ups of the artist’s hands from 1985-88. Are clapping photos in vain? Maybe, but without wall text nearby, it might be hard to tell exactly which part of the body you’re looking at. Wright uses various blurring effects to highlight creases, cracks, and folds, transforming them into fleshy abstractions. These can be somewhat disturbing. For example, an image of four fingernails that appear to be pressing into the skin might be interpreted as teeth. Two photos subtitled “Black Holes” show dark wells in the hand’s compact universe.
In the 1993 series poetryWright provided a photo-like arrangement of photos of her husband, Charles Wright’s mouth, in his reading. In these close-ups, the Pulitzer Prize-winning former American Poet is reduced to a mouthpiece, his lips sometimes in partial shadow, forming words we cannot hear. As entertaining as these stop-motion shots may be, these productions really “lower the [his] vanity. “
The poet also appears in another of Wright’s series, true saint (1980-84), which featured portraits of friends and family members playing the roles of biblical characters. The artist once said of these performances: “I’m particularly interested in role-playing and self-image, what is real and what is a forgery of reality.”
This provides a nice continuation to the third series in the show, final portrait (1980-1983). Throughout these studies, Wright asked her subjects to consider how they would approach death—what they would look like, what they would wear, etc. In Vivian and Bob Folkenflik (1983), the eponymous couple lie loosely side by side. They held hands, ready to meet their creator with a determined look in their eyes. Details draw you in: her sandals, his pants wrinkled at the knees, the leaf pattern on the sheets. In his earthly ending, the Wright brothers’ son Luke chose to arm himself with a rifle, an axe, and a knife, his tiny body stretched out on the ground in a chilling illusion of death in birth.
Holly Wright: “Vanity” Fralin Art Museum runs until January 5, 2025. exhibition Curated by Hannah Cattarin and M. Jordan Love.
