More pixels

There are two pictures on show at the Saatchi Gallery which illustrate the problem I've found with gallery photographs (see "after the gap").

The first is a large print of an imaginary rubbish tip, stitched together from many images, by Rashid Rana. It's an impressive piece, verging on the abstract, but gaining power from a close inspection revealing the subject. The second is a smaller, more intimate image, of a female figure sitting on a rock over water in what looks like a cave. It has some haunting quality. Approaching the picture, it looks as if the photographer (Ryan McGinley) has deliberately avoided sharpening or noise reduction.

While the first is a more immediately striking piece, with size, colour, and subject all contributing to impact, it does not allow the viewer to feel it as an object: however closely it is approached, it is still a reproduction of some thing that exists, not an object in itself. McGinley's piece, on the other hand, has a raw existence of its own. The visibility of the noise, of the pixel structure that makes the image, provides a doorway into the viewer's temporary ownership of the picture.

This is not to detract from Rana's piece - but I like to find some involvement in any visual art pieces that I look at, and this provides two examples in the same building that illustrate my observation.

The Saatchi is good visit right now, not least because  Richard Wilson's wonderful 20:50 oil installation is there. I went to see it several times at Boundary Road, and was delighted when Burkham surprised me with it the other day. The only disappointment is that the walkway which takes you inside the piece is roped off, denying first-timers the real icing on its cake. Odd.