kevin van aelst: staged photography

‘tesseract’ (2009), by kevin van aelst all images © kevin van aelst

the works of american photographer kevin van aelst transform everyday objects into visual and conceptual explorations of grander concepts.

a kind of associative and almost metonymic logic is at work as he recontextualizes the familiar shape of gummi worms into genetic karyotype charts, a measuring tape into a stretch of road, or a roll of painters’ tape into an ocean.

‘driving at night’ (2009)

the photographs are all staged portraits of objects; van aelst performs only minor colour and tone adjustment in post-production. the experience of working with the objects and transforming real space is important to his own process and vision, which seeks to pull out the universal ideas, images, and sensations that lie latent in everyday physical materials.

‘the ocean’ (2010)

‘memento mori (all of my good ideas)’ (2010)

‘equally important are the ‘big picture’ and the ‘little things,” van aelst explains: ‘the mundane and relatable artifacts of our daily lives, and the more mysterious notions of life and existence. this work is about creating order where we expect to find randomness, and also hints that the minutiae all around us is capable of communicating much larger ideas.’

‘chromosomes’ (2005)

left: ‘right index finger’ (2007) right: ‘left middle finger’ (2007)

‘apple globe’ (2007)

‘in search of perfect states’ (2010)