Oblivion 15N
Artist
David Maisel
(American, born 1961)
Date2004; printed 2008
MediumChromogenic print
DimensionsUnframed: 40 x 40 inches (101.6 x 101.6 cm)
Credit LineGift of the Hall Family Foundation
Object number2009.37.3
Signedsigned in pen on label on back: "David Maisel."
On View
Not on viewCollections
DescriptionImage of an aerial view of Los Angeles, as seen in negative. There are many streets and roads dividing the landscape; in the background, the mountains are visible.Gallery LabelDavid Maisel has long been concerned with the negative and at times disastrous effects that humans have had on the environment. His foreboding aerial views of Los Angeles, printed in negative to enhance both the disorienting abstraction and oppressive darkness of the landscape, suggest an alien, postapocalyptic world in which freeways become fissures and trees appear like bruises on the earth’s skin. Maisel’s elevated vantage point emphasizes our collective rather than individual complicity in creating this contemporary urban existence. Maisel has said of his Oblivion series: “These images imply an incessant search for sanctuary that never ends.”
Copyright© David Maisel
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