Photography at It's Best with Phoniex Voltaire

Over the past four years Voltaire’s photography has appeared in over 15 exhibitions across the US and Canada. His images were shown at the two most recent Seattle Erotic Arts Festival exhibitions – the rough equivalent of the Salon de Paris of the late 19th century for the genre – and subsequently placed in permanent collections in that city. H Gallery (617 W. Nineteenth St.) will give us the opportunity between October 16th and 29th to see Voltaire’s photography by exhibiting many of the pieces that have toured the country and many that have not been exhibited before. Voltaire’s fascination with the black female form started with his earlier work in Peau Moite (roughly translated to “damp skin”). He was inspired by Uwe Ommer and Renee Cox, but did not want to emulate their style or, in the case of the latter artist, the controversy. This blue-toned series of photographs uses water droplets on bare skin to draw attention to texture and body structure. Sensual and geometric by turns, Voltaire’s minimalist style allows the body to speak for itself – a style that has carried forward into his current work. Ethical Nudity evolved from Voltaire’s concept of Method Photography. In this technique model and photographer work together much like actor and director in film and theatre – familiar territory with 6 years of designing theatrical lighting in Montreal behind him. Models are given selected images to use as inspiration. They assign their own interpretations to the images by drawing on personal experience. In short, the models own the emotional content of the image with the task of the photographer being to capture the moment. Tune in/Log In/Call In