‘All the work is made live, on location and in-camera,’ DaSilva explains. ‘There’s no digital imaging or Photoshop used to create the photographs. I physically move through the space while drawing or writing with the lamps in real time.’ The Reverb exhibition shows DaSilva’s two work styles: light graffiti text-based photographs and environmental light painting photographs. The light graffiti images comment on social and political topics, from actor Charlie Sheen’s sensational media presence to Chinese artist and activist Ai Weiwei’s imprisonment. To create the graffiti, DaSilva manually moves compact fluorescent lamps . The environmental light paintings were inspired by the architecture of the historic abandoned Simon Silk Mill in Easton, Pennsylvania, which will be renovated into artists’ community lofts. For this graffiti, DaSilva manually moved 2.5m tubular fluorescent lamps that the still camera recorded. ‘The challenge of drawing and writing text with light graffiti is to execute legibility,’ DaSilva says. ‘It’s not possible to see what the camera is recording while I am drawing, so it requires a repetitive persistence to achieve the intended result.’ The exhibit can be seen at NYC's Able Fine Art until 30 August.
Reverb
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