‘200 Million & Counting’ – photo-media exhibition by Lizzie Hollins

The Colour Factory is a print lab in Fitzroy Melbourne, that has recently opened an exhibition space on site featuring monthly shows with a preference for photographic work.

Lizzie Hollins’ work was produced in Europe, possibly whilst holidaying or backpacking. Hollins is interested in the tourist impact on culture and economy. I think the nature of humans traveling around the globe and gathering around certain destinations is quite an inspiration. It is interesting to step outside your environment whilst traveling and by shooting from an ariel vantage point, Hollins has achieved this whilst documenting something beautiful in the process.

The series of large scale images hang spaciously in contrast to a single monochrome projected video. The video studies the movement of pedestrian travellers or natives in an unknown city. Exposed for the shadows, the video image is predominatiely washed out white with silhouetted shapes of legs and then a moment of detail rises up from the sun bleached pavement.

The printed images immediately remind me of Andreas Gursky ariel work, who has studied plenty of mass gatherings but these pictures are quite different in that there are minimal people in the pictures. The gatherings are either humans in transit, walking around a location or stationary shapes, sitting gently in a park reading books and lounging. It’s interesting to note how humans seem to cluster whilst walking somewhere and then sit evenly spaced in a wide open park.

Up close, the printed images slightly disappoint, as the detail does not hold up for close scrutiny. This is due to the quality of capture but at normal viewing distance, they are fascinating. The patterns and texture lead your imagination on tangents, not unlike pondering abstract shapes in the clouds. I’m not sure that I would find all that Hollins hoped to express without an artist statement, I am sure this is an exhibition worth checking out. Coffee stains in the grass, tourist bodies forming a question mark shape and then noticing the shadow of a bridge that Hollins may well have been standing on to take the picture.

The Colour Factory Gallery – 409 Gore Street, Fitzroy. Opening hours are Monday – Friday, 8.30am – 5.30pm, Saturday 1.00 – 4.00pm.
The Exhibition runs from March 30-April 30, 2010 and you can contact the gallery on 03 9419 8756 to check easter opening hours.