Jeff Wall is renowned for large-format photographs with subject matter that ranges from mundane corners of the urban environment, to elaborate tableaux that take on the scale and complexity of 19th-century history paintings.
Wall struck on the idea of producing large, backlit photographs after seeing an illuminated advertisement from a bus window. Having recently been to the Prado, Madrid, the artist combined his knowledge of the Western pictorial tradition – he had studied art history at London’s Courtauld Institute – with his interest in contemporary media, to create one of most influential visions in contemporary art. Wall calls his photographs ‘prose poems’, after the writings of Charles Baudelaire, a description that emphasises how each picture should be experienced rather than understood as an illustration of a specific narrative. His pictures may depict an instant in a scenario, but the before and after that moment are left unknown, allowing them to remain open to multiple interpretations. The prose poem format allows any truth claims for the photograph – the facts we expect from journalistic photography – to remain suspended, and Wall believes that in that state of suspension the viewer experiences pleasure.
In addition to the light-boxes, Wall has made, since 1996, black-and-white prints and large-scale colour inkjet photographs.
Jeff Wall was born in 1946 in Vancouver where he lives and works. He has exhibited widely, including solo exhibitions at Glenstone, Maryland (2021); Economou Collection, Athens (2019); Kunsthalle Mannheim, Germany, touring to Mudam Luxembourg (2018); Pérez Art Museum, Miami (2015); Stedelijk Museum, Amsterdam, touring to Kunsthaus Bregenz, Austria and Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, Humlebaek, Denmark (2014–15); Art Gallery of Western Australia, touring to National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne and Museum of Contemporary Art Australia, Sydney (2012–13); Pinakothek der Moderne, Munich, Germany (2013); Centro Galego de Arte Contemporanea, Santiago de Compostela, Spain (2011); Museo Tamayo, Mexico City (2008); The Museum of Modern Art, New York touring to The Art Institute of Chicago and San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (2007); and Tate Modern, London touring to Schaulager, Basel, Switzerland (2005). Group exhibitions include 5th Shanghai Biennale (2004); Documenta 11, Kassel, Germany (2002); 12th Biennale of Sydney (2000); 24th Bienal de São Paulo (1998); and Documenta 10, Kassel, Germany (1997).
Current gallery exhibition
27 April – 25 June 2022
White Cube Mason's Yard
White Cube is pleased to present an exhibition of works by Jeff Wall at Mason’s Yard. Comprising both new and earlier photographs spanning a twenty-year period, the selection foregrounds Wall’s attention to the forms and methods of picture making and his prolonged observation of everyday life.
Since the 1980s, Wall has made documentary photographs alongside what he terms ‘cinematographic’ pictures, all of which emerge from similar processes of study and reflection. Trap Set (2021) was taken during mink season on a cold February day in the suburbs of Wall’s native Vancouver. Animal traps, one of mankind’s oldest devices, remind us of our original cunning intelligence. The equally cleverly designed Playground Structure (2008) depicts another contraption waiting for its users, in this case, children at play, possibly those living in the suburban houses in the background.
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