[Untitled, Geometrics: Ground Works]
Raised in rural North Carolina, Hall began his education in architecture at the North Carolina School of the Arts. A scholarship to train with the American Ballet Theater brought him to New York City, after which he worked as a fashion model in Paris, Milan, and London. Inspired by European architectural traditions, he pursued a wide-ranging career as a photographer of architecture, interior decor, and gardens. This sequence of photographs, part of his "Ground Works" series, records the geometric shapes created by reflected sunlight on a manicured lawn. Elemental in their simplicity, the images set up a captivating tension between surface and depth, between hard-edged geometry of Platonic forms and the transitory messiness of nature. The series, created shortly before the artist's untimely death, represents the culmination of his lifelong interest in seriality, architectural abstraction, and the delights of the visible world.
Artwork Details
- Title: [Untitled, Geometrics: Ground Works]
- Artist: John M. Hall (American, Hurdle Mills, North Carolina 1952–2019 New York)
- Date: 2014–19
- Medium: Inkjet print
- Dimensions: Image: 15 1/16 × 22 5/16 in. (38.2 × 56.7 cm)
Sheet: 19 in. × 26 1/2 in. (48.3 × 67.3 cm) - Classification: Photographs
- Credit Line: Anonymous Gift, in memory of John M. Hall, 2021
- Object Number: 2021.38.4
- Rights and Reproduction: © Estate of John M. Hall
- Curatorial Department: Photographs
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