MOLLY LANDRETH’S AMERICAN GOTH CHICKS
[Fashionista and agent provocateur Kevin Parrish is our guest reviewer today]
Molly Landreth’s cogent style neither flaunts nor waters down today’s American queer and gender-transformed youth culture. Her photographs update the confrontational style of Diane Arbus by way of exact and historically contextualized content: queers today, alive, in love, at home, on the streets. Smacking at times of snapshots from pretty much anywhere in middle America, Landreth never employs the overtly composed mechanisms of a Robert Mapplethorpe or Cindy Sherman. While some images might drive us to smirk with their candy colored novelty (see “Ward”), it is the overall lack of queer-ness in Landreth’s work that is truly arresting. Each image is shot with sincere tenderness, and the affection and innocence conveyed by her subjects make each photograph remarkably contagious gifts. From her website:
Molly Landreth, 29, received her B.A. in Studio Art from Scripps College in Claremont, California in 2001 where she cultivated her love for photography, digital & feminist art and art history. In 2005 she received a M.F.A. in Photography and Related Media from the School of Visual Arts in New York City, where she began her current project, Embodiment. This project is a group of portraits that explores and aims to create a feeling of what it means to be queer today. She is currently living and working in Seattle, WA and exhibiting nationally. This project is being funded in part by a grant from the Humble Arts Foundation.
