Ashes and Snow
Encyclopedia
Ashes and Snow by Canadian artist Gregory Colbert
is an installation of photographic artworks, films, and a novel in letters that travels in the Nomadic Museum
, a temporary structure built exclusively to house the exhibition. The work explores the shared poetic sensibilities of human beings and animals. Ashes and Snow has traveled to Venice
, New York
, Santa Monica
, Tokyo
, and Mexico City
. To date, Ashes and Snow has attracted more than 10 million visitors, making it the most attended exhibition by a living artist in history.
” films. None of the photographic or film images have been digitally collaged or superimposed.
The films are poetic narratives, rather than documentaries. The full-length feature Ashes and Snow: The Film was edited by two-time Oscar-winner
Pietro Scalia
. It is narrated by Laurence Fishburne
(English version), Enrique Rocha (Spanish version), Ken Watanabe
(Japanese version), and Jeanne Moreau
(French version). Narrations are forthcoming in Portuguese, Russian, Chinese, Arabic, German, and Italian. Musical collaborators include Michael Brook
, David Darling
, Heiner Goebbels
, Lisa Gerrard
, Lukas Foss
, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, and Djivan Gasparyan
.
The title Ashes and Snow refers to the literary component of the exhibition—a fictional account of a man who, over the course of a yearlong journey, composes 365 letters to his wife. Fragments of the letters comprise the narration in the films. Ashes and Snow: A Novel in Letters by Gregory Colbert was first published in 2004.
Since 1992, Gregory Colbert has launched more than 60 expeditions to locations including India
, Burma, Sri Lanka
, Egypt
, Dominica
, Ethiopia
, Kenya
, Tonga
, Namibia
, and Antarctica to film and photograph interactions between human beings and animals. Elephant
s, whale
s, manatee
s, sacred ibis
, Antigone cranes
, royal eagles
, Gyr falcons
, rhinoceros hornbills
, cheetah
s, leopard
s, African wild dog
s, caracal
s, baboon
s, eland, meerkat
s, gibbon
s, orangutan
s, and saltwater crocodiles
are among the animals that he has filmed and photographed. Human subjects include Burmese monks, trance
dancers, San people, and other indigenous peoples
from around the world. To date, Colbert
has collaborated with over 130 species.
The public debut of Ashes and Snow took place in 2002 at the Arsenale in Venice
. The exhibition has since traveled in the Nomadic Museum to New York, Santa Monica, Tokyo, and Mexico City.
originally conceived the idea for a sustainable traveling museum in 1999. He envisioned a structure that could easily be assembled or recycled in each location and that would serve as the architectural component of the installation on its global journey.
The Arsenale
inspired the architectural concepts of the Nomadic Museum
, which debuted in New York in 2005. The first Nomadic Museum utilized shipping containers stacked in a checkerboard pattern to create the exterior and interior walls. The architecture of the Nomadic Museum continued to evolve as the exhibition traveled to Los Angeles in 2006 and Tokyo in 2007.
The most recent version of the Nomadic Museum was located on the Zócalo
in Mexico City
. Designed by Colombian architect Simón Vélez
in collaboration with Gregory Colbert
, it demonstrated sustainable practices and an innovative architectural approach through the use of guadua bamboo
as the primary structural component. The first of its kind, the 5,130 square meters (55,218 square feet) Zócalo Nomadic Museum was the largest bamboo building ever built.
Like all elements of Ashes and Snow, the Nomadic Museum
will be redesigned and adapted to each new location.
The Nomadic Museum, the traveling home of Ashes and Snow, is charted to travel the globe
with no final destination.
, BBC International
, Fox News and CCTV (China)
.
Critical reception of the exhibition has been largely positive. In one of the first reviews of Ashes and Snow, Alan Riding wrote for The New York Times
, "The earth-tone photographs are...windows to a world in which silence and patience govern time." Modern Painters
, art critic Joseph Giovannini wrote: “The Nomadic Museum restores the possibility of wonder to museums whose excesses of clarity and light have banished the shadows. The power of the show and the power of the building are so reciprocal that it is difficult to separate the dancer from the dance. Colbert and Ban
condition the senses of the visitors to facilitate their psychological entry into the space of the photographs, to deliver the message that man is not, and cannot be, separate from the nature within which he evolved... Ashes and Snow is a show that is disarmingly, and grandly, simple." A Japanese edition of Newsweek
praised the exhibition as "an expression of the poetic possibilities of a harmonious relationship between animals and man.” In The Globe and Mail
, Simon Houpt wrote that "Colbert’s work operates in a parallel universe to ours, an earnest, refreshing, post-ironic world where pure wonder and awe still reside." Felicity Glover wrote for the South China Morning Post
, "Colbert's images are mind-blowing; more so upon learning that none of them have been digitally altered or superimposed... The sepia and umber tones give the photographs — printed in a distinctive encaustic process on handmade Japanese paper — a sense of timelessness; they could have been taken now or 100 years ago."
However, not all reviews of Ashes and Snow have been favorable. A review in The New York Times
described it as "an exercise in conspicuous narcissism that is off the charts, even by today's standards," criticizing its colonialism-tinged portrayals of non-Western subjects and its "derivative" imagery. KCRW
's art critic Edward Goldman referred to the exhibition as "snake oil from a travelling art salesman," declaring that the imagery was likely to appeal to those who "are inclined to open [their] hearts and wallets to the rhetoric of TV evangelists like Pat Robertson
and Jerry Falwell
." Author and critic Amardeep Singh was "deeply annoyed by the strong current of exoticism and artificiality," finding fault with the "manipulative environment of the gallery," which "plays up a 'spiritual' and 'exotic' atmosphere that nullifies any objective quality the photographs themselves might have."
Gregory Colbert
Gregory Colbert is a Canadian film-maker and photographer best known as the creator of Ashes and Snow, an exhibition of photographic artworks and films housed in the Nomadic Museum.-Career:...
is an installation of photographic artworks, films, and a novel in letters that travels in the Nomadic Museum
Nomadic Museum
The Nomadic Museum is a purpose-built temporary structure used to house the Ashes and Snow photography and film exhibition by Gregory Colbert.Gregory Colbert originally conceived of the idea for a sustainable traveling museum in 1999...
, a temporary structure built exclusively to house the exhibition. The work explores the shared poetic sensibilities of human beings and animals. Ashes and Snow has traveled to Venice
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...
, New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
, Santa Monica
Santa Mônica
Santa Mônica is a town and municipality in the state of Paraná in the Southern Region of Brazil.-References:...
, Tokyo
Tokyo
, ; officially , is one of the 47 prefectures of Japan. Tokyo is the capital of Japan, the center of the Greater Tokyo Area, and the largest metropolitan area of Japan. It is the seat of the Japanese government and the Imperial Palace, and the home of the Japanese Imperial Family...
, and Mexico City
Mexico City
Mexico City is the Federal District , capital of Mexico and seat of the federal powers of the Mexican Union. It is a federal entity within Mexico which is not part of any one of the 31 Mexican states but belongs to the federation as a whole...
. To date, Ashes and Snow has attracted more than 10 million visitors, making it the most attended exhibition by a living artist in history.
Description
Each exhibition consists of more than fifty large-scale mixed media photographic artworks and three film installations. The photographic artworks measure approximately 3.5 by 2.5 meters (11.5 x 8.25 feet). Each one is created using an encaustic process on handmade Japanese paper. The films include one 60-minute full-length 35mm film and two short “haikuHaiku
' , plural haiku, is a very short form of Japanese poetry typically characterised by three qualities:* The essence of haiku is "cutting"...
” films. None of the photographic or film images have been digitally collaged or superimposed.
The films are poetic narratives, rather than documentaries. The full-length feature Ashes and Snow: The Film was edited by two-time Oscar-winner
Academy Awards
An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...
Pietro Scalia
Pietro Scalia
Pietro Scalia is an Italian-American film editor.-Life and career:He was born in Catania , but later he moved to Switzerland with his parents and attended Swiss-German schools until high school. After graduation he decided to move to the United States to pursue his college education...
. It is narrated by Laurence Fishburne
Laurence Fishburne
Laurence John Fishburne III is an American film and stage actor, playwright, director, and producer. He is perhaps best known for his roles as Morpheus in the Matrix science fiction film trilogy, as Cowboy Curtis on the 1980's television show Pee-wee's Playhouse, and as singer-musician Ike Turner...
(English version), Enrique Rocha (Spanish version), Ken Watanabe
Ken Watanabe
is a Japanese stage, film, and television actor. To English-speaking audiences he is known for playing tragic hero characters, such as General Tadamichi Kuribayashi in Letters from Iwo Jima and Lord Katsumoto Moritsugu in The Last Samurai, for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best...
(Japanese version), and Jeanne Moreau
Jeanne Moreau
Jeanne Moreau is a French actress, singer, screenwriter and director.She made her theatrical debut in 1947, and established herself as one of the leading actresses of the Comédie-Française...
(French version). Narrations are forthcoming in Portuguese, Russian, Chinese, Arabic, German, and Italian. Musical collaborators include Michael Brook
Michael Brook
Michael Brook is a Canadian guitarist, inventor, producer, and film music composer. He plays in many genres, including rock, electronica, world music, minimalism and film scores....
, David Darling
David Darling (musician)
David Darling is an American cellist and composer. He won the Grammy award for Best New Age Album in 2010. He has performed and recorded with artists such as Bobby McFerrin and Spyro Gyra in addition to putting out several solo and small ensemble albums as well as albums of his...
, Heiner Goebbels
Heiner Goebbels
Heiner Goebbels is a German composer, music director and professor at Justus-Liebig-University in Gießen and at the European Graduate School in Saas-Fee, Switzerland....
, Lisa Gerrard
Lisa Gerrard
Lisa Gerrard is an Australian musician, singer, and composer who rose to prominence as part of the music group Dead Can Dance with former music partner Brendan Perry....
, Lukas Foss
Lukas Foss
Lukas Foss was a German-born American composer, conductor, and pianist.-Music career:He was born Lukas Fuchs in Berlin, Germany in 1922. His father was the philosopher and scholar Martin Fuchs...
, Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan, and Djivan Gasparyan
Djivan Gasparyan
Djivan Gasparyan is an Armenian musician and composer. He plays the duduk, a double reed woodwind instrument related to the orchestral oboe. Gasparyan is known as the Master of the duduk.-Biography:...
.
The title Ashes and Snow refers to the literary component of the exhibition—a fictional account of a man who, over the course of a yearlong journey, composes 365 letters to his wife. Fragments of the letters comprise the narration in the films. Ashes and Snow: A Novel in Letters by Gregory Colbert was first published in 2004.
Since 1992, Gregory Colbert has launched more than 60 expeditions to locations including India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
, Burma, Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...
, Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
, Dominica
Dominica
Dominica , officially the Commonwealth of Dominica, is an island nation in the Lesser Antilles region of the Caribbean Sea, south-southeast of Guadeloupe and northwest of Martinique. Its size is and the highest point in the country is Morne Diablotins, which has an elevation of . The Commonwealth...
, Ethiopia
Ethiopia
Ethiopia , officially known as the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a country located in the Horn of Africa. It is the second-most populous nation in Africa, with over 82 million inhabitants, and the tenth-largest by area, occupying 1,100,000 km2...
, Kenya
Kenya
Kenya , officially known as the Republic of Kenya, is a country in East Africa that lies on the equator, with the Indian Ocean to its south-east...
, Tonga
Tonga
Tonga, officially the Kingdom of Tonga , is a state and an archipelago in the South Pacific Ocean, comprising 176 islands scattered over of ocean in the South Pacific...
, Namibia
Namibia
Namibia, officially the Republic of Namibia , is a country in southern Africa whose western border is the Atlantic Ocean. It shares land borders with Angola and Zambia to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south and east. It gained independence from South Africa on 21 March...
, and Antarctica to film and photograph interactions between human beings and animals. Elephant
Elephant
Elephants are large land mammals in two extant genera of the family Elephantidae: Elephas and Loxodonta, with the third genus Mammuthus extinct...
s, whale
Whale
Whale is the common name for various marine mammals of the order Cetacea. The term whale sometimes refers to all cetaceans, but more often it excludes dolphins and porpoises, which belong to suborder Odontoceti . This suborder also includes the sperm whale, killer whale, pilot whale, and beluga...
s, manatee
Manatee
Manatees are large, fully aquatic, mostly herbivorous marine mammals sometimes known as sea cows...
s, sacred ibis
Sacred Ibis
The African Sacred Ibis is a species of ibis.-Description:An adult individual is 68 cm long with all-white body plumage apart from dark plumes on the rump. The bald head and neck, thick curved bill and legs are black. The white wings show a black rear border in flight...
, Antigone cranes
Crane (bird)
Cranes are a family, Gruidae, of large, long-legged and long-necked birds in the order Gruiformes. There are fifteen species of crane in four genera. Unlike the similar-looking but unrelated herons, cranes fly with necks outstretched, not pulled back...
, royal eagles
Eagle
Eagles are members of the bird family Accipitridae, and belong to several genera which are not necessarily closely related to each other. Most of the more than 60 species occur in Eurasia and Africa. Outside this area, just two species can be found in the United States and Canada, nine more in...
, Gyr falcons
Gyrfalcon
The Gyrfalcon — Falco rusticolus — is the largest of the falcon species. The Gyrfalcon breeds on Arctic coasts and the islands of North America, Europe, and Asia. It is mainly resident there also, but some Gyrfalcons disperse more widely after the breeding season, or in winter.Individual vagrancy...
, rhinoceros hornbills
Hornbill
Hornbills are a family of bird found in tropical and subtropical Africa, Asia and Melanesia. They are characterized by a long, down-curved bill which is frequently brightly-colored and sometimes has a casque on the upper mandible. Both the common English and the scientific name of the family...
, cheetah
Cheetah
The cheetah is a large-sized feline inhabiting most of Africa and parts of the Middle East. The cheetah is the only extant member of the genus Acinonyx, most notable for modifications in the species' paws...
s, leopard
Leopard
The leopard , Panthera pardus, is a member of the Felidae family and the smallest of the four "big cats" in the genus Panthera, the other three being the tiger, lion, and jaguar. The leopard was once distributed across eastern and southern Asia and Africa, from Siberia to South Africa, but its...
s, African wild dog
African Wild Dog
Lycaon pictus is a large canid found only in Africa, especially in savannas and lightly wooded areas. It is variously called the African wild dog, African hunting dog, Cape hunting dog, painted dog, painted wolf, painted hunting dog, spotted dog, or ornate wolf...
s, caracal
Caracal
The caracal is a fiercely territorial medium-sized cat ranging over Western Asia, South Asia and Africa.The word caracal comes from the Turkish word "karakulak", meaning "black ear". In North India and Pakistan, the caracal is locally known as syahgosh or shyahgosh, which is a Persian term...
s, baboon
Baboon
Baboons are African and Arabian Old World monkeys belonging to the genus Papio, part of the subfamily Cercopithecinae. There are five species, which are some of the largest non-hominoid members of the primate order; only the mandrill and the drill are larger...
s, eland, meerkat
Meerkat
The meerkat or suricate, Suricata suricatta, is a small mammal belonging to the mongoose family. Meerkats live in all parts of the Kalahari Desert in Botswana, in much of the Namib Desert in Namibia and southwestern Angola, and in South Africa. A group of meerkats is called a "mob", "gang" or "clan"...
s, gibbon
Gibbon
Gibbons are apes in the family Hylobatidae . The family is divided into four genera based on their diploid chromosome number: Hylobates , Hoolock , Nomascus , and Symphalangus . The extinct Bunopithecus sericus is a gibbon or gibbon-like ape which, until recently, was thought to be closely related...
s, orangutan
Orangutan
Orangutans are the only exclusively Asian genus of extant great ape. The largest living arboreal animals, they have proportionally longer arms than the other, more terrestrial, great apes. They are among the most intelligent primates and use a variety of sophisticated tools, also making sleeping...
s, and saltwater crocodiles
Crocodile
A crocodile is any species belonging to the family Crocodylidae . The term can also be used more loosely to include all extant members of the order Crocodilia: i.e...
are among the animals that he has filmed and photographed. Human subjects include Burmese monks, trance
Trance
Trance denotes a variety of processes, ecstasy, techniques, modalities and states of mind, awareness and consciousness. Trance states may occur involuntarily and unbidden.The term trance may be associated with meditation, magic, flow, and prayer...
dancers, San people, and other indigenous peoples
Indigenous peoples
Indigenous peoples are ethnic groups that are defined as indigenous according to one of the various definitions of the term, there is no universally accepted definition but most of which carry connotations of being the "original inhabitants" of a territory....
from around the world. To date, Colbert
Gregory Colbert
Gregory Colbert is a Canadian film-maker and photographer best known as the creator of Ashes and Snow, an exhibition of photographic artworks and films housed in the Nomadic Museum.-Career:...
has collaborated with over 130 species.
The public debut of Ashes and Snow took place in 2002 at the Arsenale in Venice
Venetian Arsenal
The Venetian Arsenal was a complex of state-owned shipyards and armories clustered together in Venice in northern Italy. It was responsible for the bulk of Venice's naval power during the middle part of the second millennium AD...
. The exhibition has since traveled in the Nomadic Museum to New York, Santa Monica, Tokyo, and Mexico City.
The Nomadic Museum
ColbertGregory Colbert
Gregory Colbert is a Canadian film-maker and photographer best known as the creator of Ashes and Snow, an exhibition of photographic artworks and films housed in the Nomadic Museum.-Career:...
originally conceived the idea for a sustainable traveling museum in 1999. He envisioned a structure that could easily be assembled or recycled in each location and that would serve as the architectural component of the installation on its global journey.
The Arsenale
Venetian Arsenal
The Venetian Arsenal was a complex of state-owned shipyards and armories clustered together in Venice in northern Italy. It was responsible for the bulk of Venice's naval power during the middle part of the second millennium AD...
inspired the architectural concepts of the Nomadic Museum
Nomadic Museum
The Nomadic Museum is a purpose-built temporary structure used to house the Ashes and Snow photography and film exhibition by Gregory Colbert.Gregory Colbert originally conceived of the idea for a sustainable traveling museum in 1999...
, which debuted in New York in 2005. The first Nomadic Museum utilized shipping containers stacked in a checkerboard pattern to create the exterior and interior walls. The architecture of the Nomadic Museum continued to evolve as the exhibition traveled to Los Angeles in 2006 and Tokyo in 2007.
The most recent version of the Nomadic Museum was located on the Zócalo
Zócalo
The Zócalo is the main plaza or square in the heart of the historic center of Mexico City. The plaza used to be known simply as the "Main Square" or "Arms Square," and today its formal name is Plaza de la Constitución...
in Mexico City
Mexico City
Mexico City is the Federal District , capital of Mexico and seat of the federal powers of the Mexican Union. It is a federal entity within Mexico which is not part of any one of the 31 Mexican states but belongs to the federation as a whole...
. Designed by Colombian architect Simón Vélez
Simón Vélez
Simón Vélez is a prize-winning architect, and the most eminent proponent of bamboo as an essential building component.- Life and Work :The son and grandson of architects, Simón Vélez was born in Manizales, Colombia, in 1949...
in collaboration with Gregory Colbert
Gregory Colbert
Gregory Colbert is a Canadian film-maker and photographer best known as the creator of Ashes and Snow, an exhibition of photographic artworks and films housed in the Nomadic Museum.-Career:...
, it demonstrated sustainable practices and an innovative architectural approach through the use of guadua bamboo
Guadua
Guadua is a Neotropics genus of thorny clumping bamboo, ranging from moderate to very large species. Physically, Guadua angustifolia is noted for being the largest Neotropics bamboo. The genus is similar to Bambusa and is sometimes included in Bambusa...
as the primary structural component. The first of its kind, the 5,130 square meters (55,218 square feet) Zócalo Nomadic Museum was the largest bamboo building ever built.
Like all elements of Ashes and Snow, the Nomadic Museum
Nomadic Museum
The Nomadic Museum is a purpose-built temporary structure used to house the Ashes and Snow photography and film exhibition by Gregory Colbert.Gregory Colbert originally conceived of the idea for a sustainable traveling museum in 1999...
will be redesigned and adapted to each new location.
The Nomadic Museum, the traveling home of Ashes and Snow, is charted to travel the globe
Globe
A globe is a three-dimensional scale model of Earth or other spheroid celestial body such as a planet, star, or moon...
with no final destination.
Critical reception
Ashes and Snow has been covered by numerous major news outlets in North America, South America, Europe, Asia and Africa, including CNNCNN
Cable News Network is a U.S. cable news channel founded in 1980 by Ted Turner. Upon its launch, CNN was the first channel to provide 24-hour television news coverage, and the first all-news television channel in the United States...
, BBC International
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
, Fox News and CCTV (China)
China Central Television
China Central Television or Chinese Central Television, commonly abbreviated as CCTV, is the major state television broadcaster in mainland China. CCTV has a network of 19 channels broadcasting different programmes and is accessible to more than one billion viewers...
.
Critical reception of the exhibition has been largely positive. In one of the first reviews of Ashes and Snow, Alan Riding wrote for The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
, "The earth-tone photographs are...windows to a world in which silence and patience govern time." Modern Painters
Modern Painters (magazine)
Modern Painters is a monthly art magazine published in New York City by Louise Blouin Media. The magazine is published 10 times per year; it includes profiles on two international artists per issue; columns by international contributors; interviews with and articles by contemporary artists and...
, art critic Joseph Giovannini wrote: “The Nomadic Museum restores the possibility of wonder to museums whose excesses of clarity and light have banished the shadows. The power of the show and the power of the building are so reciprocal that it is difficult to separate the dancer from the dance. Colbert and Ban
Shigeru Ban
Shigeru Ban is an accomplished Japanese and international architect, most famous for his innovative work with paper, particularly recycled cardboard paper tubes used to quickly and efficiently house disaster victims...
condition the senses of the visitors to facilitate their psychological entry into the space of the photographs, to deliver the message that man is not, and cannot be, separate from the nature within which he evolved... Ashes and Snow is a show that is disarmingly, and grandly, simple." A Japanese edition of Newsweek
Newsweek
Newsweek is an American weekly news magazine published in New York City. It is distributed throughout the United States and internationally. It is the second-largest news weekly magazine in the U.S., having trailed Time in circulation and advertising revenue for most of its existence...
praised the exhibition as "an expression of the poetic possibilities of a harmonious relationship between animals and man.” In The Globe and Mail
The Globe and Mail
The Globe and Mail is a nationally distributed Canadian newspaper, based in Toronto and printed in six cities across the country. With a weekly readership of approximately 1 million, it is Canada's largest-circulation national newspaper and second-largest daily newspaper after the Toronto Star...
, Simon Houpt wrote that "Colbert’s work operates in a parallel universe to ours, an earnest, refreshing, post-ironic world where pure wonder and awe still reside." Felicity Glover wrote for the South China Morning Post
South China Morning Post
The South China Morning Post , together with its Sunday edition, the Sunday Morning Post, is an English-language Hong Kong newspaper, published by the SCMP Group with a circulation of 104,000....
, "Colbert's images are mind-blowing; more so upon learning that none of them have been digitally altered or superimposed... The sepia and umber tones give the photographs — printed in a distinctive encaustic process on handmade Japanese paper — a sense of timelessness; they could have been taken now or 100 years ago."
However, not all reviews of Ashes and Snow have been favorable. A review in The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
described it as "an exercise in conspicuous narcissism that is off the charts, even by today's standards," criticizing its colonialism-tinged portrayals of non-Western subjects and its "derivative" imagery. KCRW
KCRW
KCRW is a public radio station broadcasting from the campus of Santa Monica College in Santa Monica, California, carrying a mix of National Public Radio news, talk radio and freeform music format. The general manager of KCRW is Jennifer Ferro...
's art critic Edward Goldman referred to the exhibition as "snake oil from a travelling art salesman," declaring that the imagery was likely to appeal to those who "are inclined to open [their] hearts and wallets to the rhetoric of TV evangelists like Pat Robertson
Pat Robertson
Marion Gordon "Pat" Robertson is a media mogul, television evangelist, ex-Baptist minister and businessman who is politically aligned with the Christian Right in the United States....
and Jerry Falwell
Jerry Falwell
Jerry Lamon Falwell, Sr. was an evangelical fundamentalist Southern Baptist pastor, televangelist, and a conservative commentator from the United States. He was the founding pastor of the Thomas Road Baptist Church, a megachurch in Lynchburg, Virginia...
." Author and critic Amardeep Singh was "deeply annoyed by the strong current of exoticism and artificiality," finding fault with the "manipulative environment of the gallery," which "plays up a 'spiritual' and 'exotic' atmosphere that nullifies any objective quality the photographs themselves might have."
External links
- Official website
- 13th Annual Thea Awards - Award for Outstanding Achievement - Ashes and Snow - a description of the award-winning exhibition
- Ashes and Snow at the Internet Movie Database
- "Flying Elephants Presents I" at youtube.com
- Flying Elephants Presents II" at youtube.com
- "Ashes and Snow - Feather to Fire" at youtube.com