Richard Misrach is considered one of the most influential photographers of his generation, instrumental in pioneering the use of color photography and large-scale format in the 1970s.
For over 50 years, Misrach has photographed the dynamic landscape of the American West through an environmentally aware and politically astute lens. His visually seductive, large-scale color vistas powerfully document the devastating ecological effects of human intervention, industrial development, nuclear testing and petrochemical pollution on the natural world. His best known and ongoing epic series, Desert Cantos, comprises 40 distinct but related groups of pictures that explore the complex conjunction between mankind and nature. Otherworldly images of desert seas, rock formations, and clouds are juxtaposed with unsettling scenes of desert fires, nuclear test sites, and animal burial pits.
Other bodies of work include Golden Gate, a careful study of times of day, weather, and light around San Francisco’s famed bridge; On the Beach, aerial views of individuals and groups against a backdrop of water and sand; Notations, ravishing landscapes and seascapes in a reversed color spectrum; Destroy This Memory, a haunting document shot with a 4-megapixel pocket camera of graffiti found in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina; and Petrochemical America, an in-depth examination of petrochemical pollution along the Mississippi River produced in collaboration with landscape architect Kate Orff.
[excerpted from Pace Gallery website: www.pacegallery.com]
Misrach’s works is included in numerous public collections worldwide, among them Centre National d’Art et de Culture Georges Pompidou, Paris; The Modern, Fort Worth; MoMA, New York; Smithsonian American Art Museum, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.; Victoria and Albert Museum, London; and The Whitney Museum, New York.