Reviews/Commentary
LensScratch.Blogspot
"Larry Wiese has been engaged in photography for half a century, and his curiosity and desire to explore new ideas and technologies is as strong as ever. Besides being a photogrpher, he is an educator, and has almost two decades as a gallerist under his belt. He has exhibited widely and his work is held in many public collections. Larry recenly sent me his new project, Terrain, Imagining Reality where his reimaged landscapes take on new realities."
Aline Smithson
Lensscratch.Blogspot.Com - March 2, 2012
LensScratch.Blogspot
"A recent visit to the artwalk in San Pedro, California, brought me to a terrific exhibition, Conjecture, by Larry Wiese at Gallery 478. It runs through August 27th. The exhibition features work from three series, and all share the same characteristics of a selective focus and an intriguing darkness. It's the details that make the images so interesting--glasses, hats, shapes, and taking a contemporary population and making it timeless."
Aline Smithson
Lenscratch.Blogspot.Com - June 8, 2010
From Gallery 478:
"Conjecture", is a selection of figurative images befitting his reputation as a poetic maverick, capable of spanning time and space, recognition and memory, with eloquence and conviction. Black and white images, culled from the series Recall, are moody, atmospheric time-stoppers - single or multiple figures appear quietly and completely isolated withing the frame, softened as if recalled. New color images from the Menshen portfolio reveal Wiese utilizing the very deliberate palette of a painter, with spare, almost magical color appearing against lush, dark grounds. Many images border on the abstract with multiple figures seeming to merge into one, or cut against the ground trasforming the picture plane into a self-referential organization of color and shape."
Gallery 478
478 West 7th Street
San Pedro, CA 90731
June, 2010
Gallery 478 - "Conjecture", June 3 - August 27, 2010
"Larry Wiese's involvement with photography spans more than four decades. Known for darkly spare images that are rich in tone and evocative of both grace and menace. Wiese's work has been widely exhibited, collected, and published in the United States and abroad.
Conjecture is a selection of figurative images befitting his reputation as a poetic maverick, capable of spanning time and space, recognition and memory, with eloquence and conviction. Black and white images, culled from the series Recall, are moody, atmospheric time-stoppers - single or multiple figures appear quietly and completely isolated within the frame, softened as if recalled. New color images from the Menschen portfolio reveal Wiese utilizing the very deliberate palatte of a painter, with apare, almost magical color appearing against lush, dark grounds. Many images border on the abstract with multiple figures seeming to merge into one, or cut against the ground transorming the picture plane into a self-referential organization of color and shape."
Gallery 478 Press Release
May, 2010
Working Theory Press
“The first time I saw a portfolio of Larry's images I knew I was seeing a unique vision and craft that was unlike no other. Not only do his photos allow the viewer to focus on subjects with a perspective that is elusive from most photographers, but we can get also get a glimpse of Larry's psyche as well. Add to this a strong value of craft and intention and you have to makings of a solid artistic execution. Not everyone will find his prints "easy" to engage with, but anyone who is remotely visually literate will recognize the integrity and non pandering quality that exudes from the paper. And if you're one that acknowledges the challenge, then the prints will resonate with you as only honest art can.”
Russell Dodd
Working Theory Press
January 17, 2004
From LensWork Magazine
"The third photographer I'll mention - Larry Wiese - has a natural vision that is defined by a certain visual style. Larry tells the story (in our LensWork Interview entitle Transition) of making and presenting his work to a gallery owner in the hopes of gaining representation and an exhibition. Part way through the presentation of his porfolio he suddenly broke into a cold sweat and had an anxiety attack that was so strong he interupted his presentation halfway through, then apologized and retreated. His strong reaction when prsenting his work bothered him for some time. It fueled a great deal of introspection. Finally he saw that the source of his anxiety was the realization that the work he'd been presenting to the gallery owner was not his own vision. He had been mimicking, up to that point, someone else's eye - their style and their vision.
In the subsequent months, he started over from scratch. He changed his camera, his darkroom technique, everthing about his vision. Through a series of lengthy experiments and explorations, tests and retreats, questions and more questions, with precision and hard work he eventually found a visual style that he feels exactly represents his internal vision. His images now tend to be printed quite dark, yet full of light. They are heavily diffused, showing shapes without detail. They prsent emotions, even moods, in archetype references. He prints on matte paper and achieves an inky, sensual surface with his prints that is exquisite. This is his vision, not the hard-edged, razor-sharp, zone-and-tone work of the West Coast landscape that characterized his earlier images. Once Larry found the style of his natural vision, his creative output increased explosively. Forget the old adage about ten good prints defining a great photographic year. Larry often creates ten great prints in just a few rolls of film! The volume of his work in the last five or six years is staggering. He will admit he doesn't know how long this creative vision will flow so easily, but it is fascinating to watch him work with ease and brilliance now that he is synchronized with his natural vision.
By the way, Larry recently showed me some of his early, traditional, tack-sharp, classic West Coast imagery. It was excellent. He knows how to print, knows his way around the zone system, and can do it when he needs to. What makes his creative path so interesting is that he, like so many others who have described a similar catharsis, had to work through the vision of those who went before him before he found a vision that was his own. Picasso could paint a classic Renaissance scene but moved beyond that vision to find his in cubist representations. Similarly Larry Wiese understands and values the traditions that have gone before him, but extends that tradition into his own creative vision."
Brook Jensen, Editor
LensWork Magazine
June - 2003
“The Geography of Imagination” - Photographs by Larry Wiese
LAHC Fine Arts Gallery September 21 - October 26, 2002
“Larry Wiese’s work is difficult at best. We can’t see anything happening. We (faithful) move closer. The reward is immense, the subject is seeing, and the result is eloquent.”
Ron Linden, Director, Fine Arts Gallery
Los Angeles Harbor College
October 7, 2002
Santa Barbara Museum of Art
“Rich in tone and spare in detail, the photographs of Larry Wiese draw one into mysterious spaces, leaving the viewer to explore his/her own interior terrain. A single image has the power to evoke menace, at some times, grace in others. In a recent exhibition, one was struck by the variety of responses to Wiese’s images, but also by the conviction with which people responded. Wiese has worked many years to achieve this maturity of vision. One waits with anticipation to see the next manifestations.”
Karen Sinsheimer, Curator of Photography
Santa Barbara Museum of Art
April 10, 2002
From LensWork Magazine
“It is said that the true artist is one who sees what others do not and then make it visible. Larry Wiese understands what it means to be an artist. He lives it, and it is evident in his photographs. So much of photography these days is repetitious and unoriginal, even codified--what is acceptable subject material, how it is supposed to look. And then you come across the photography of Larry Wiese – powerfully seen yet quiet. His images whisper rather than shout. And in each photograph one has the haunting feeling that you are on the edge of hearing a great cosmic secret, or seeing a mystery unfold. He sees what others do not, but it is even more than that. What sets Larry’s work apart and makes him a true artist is not what he sees but how he sees. He gives us new eyes. And this is the highest form of artistry.”
Brooks Jensen, Editor
LensWork Publishing
October 12, 2001
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
“Larry Wiese has the rare ability to record moments that resonate across boundaries of time and memory. He infuses his images with a sophisticated sense of visual styling and spontaneity without sacrificing the fleeting opportunities for multivalent emotional responses that mark truly fine photography.”
Tim Wride, Curator of Photography
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
November 11, 2001
“Larry Wiese, "Common Places", Irvine Fine Arts Center, “The Bixby Bridge”, Photograph 1996
“Wiese’s photography raises the snapping of an image to pure poetry. There is a sense of majesty in the ordinary objects he captures: gas tanks, benches, landscapes, etc. His diffused black and white technique, devoid of human subjects, results in haunting images. In The Bixby Bridge, Wiese renders the graceful, curvilinear white edges set against the bridge’s darkened steel structure. The result is like a fine chiaroscuro line drawing, with the camera painting the abstract beauty of life’s everyday places.”
Roberta Carasso, PhD
ArtScene
February 1997