Born: São Paulo, Brazil
Style: large-scale photographs of the human body, often intimate and natural.
‘I am a fine art photographer curious about elements of representation. I like to cherish the body as a source of inspiration, as a platform for metaphors, for intimacy and complexities of human nature, hoping to use the visual impact of provoking the viewer’s imagination to encourage thoughts beyond what is revealed.’
Mona Kuhn, 2020
I enjoyed looking at Mona Kuhn’s work. She treats nudity, especially female nudity, in a natural way which was in stark contrast to Guy Bourdin. It’s difficult to get an idea of scale from looking at the images online but a glimpse of the installation view in She Disappeared into Complete Silence showed them to be large.
She likes to portray people.
‘I’m interested in the body, I’m interested in the ways we represent who we are, I’m interested in the ways we were represented in the past and I’m also interested in how we will redefine ourselves. And when I’m photographing the people I know, I’m also in a way keeping a memento of who they are and the time we spent together.’
(Kuhn, M 2014)
She takes time to build her relationship to the sitter as this as this allows them to behave in a more natural and unselfconscious manner.
She takes series of photographs, connected by an idea. It might be colours that draw her – the gold and black of the desert in She Disappeared into Complete Silence for instance or the minimal colour palate of black, white pink and green and focusing on points of light for the Native series.
There is a certain amount of abstraction in all her photography and this makes for interesting viewing, holding the eye and attention. One thing I particulalry liked was her use of reflections.
There is a certain amount of abstraction in all her photography and this makes for interesting viewing, holding the eye and attention. One thing I particularly liked was her use of reflections.
She appears to take great care in how she frames her picture, shadows draw the eye and highlight what’s seen and unseen. In one photograph she ‘dresses’ her model in shadow. However, in her interview for the Los Angeles Book Review she says that her work is only censored after the shots, what you see is what she saw in the camera – reacting to the shot rather than having a fixed plan (Kuhn, M 2014).
Her Bordeaux series was reductive. She limited the use of colours: black, white and red -because this colour represents the essence of life for her..
She uses other techniques as well. In her Evidence series she uses soft focus – as it’s not too abstract but still allows imagination about what is going on
Her Bordeaux series was reductive. She limited the use of colours: black, white and red -because this colour represents the essence of life for her..
References:
Kuhn, M (2020) Mona Kuhn: About – Bio [Online] Available at: https://www.monakuhn.com/pages/bio Los Angeles Review of Books: Photographer Spotlight: Mona Kuhn (2014) [Online Video] Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k-mcZcvWmog&has_verified=1
Katies Photographic Journey 