EXHIBIT

Garden of Dreams: Photographs by Austin Emerson

September 1 – October 25, 2024

Monday, September 23, 7:00: Reception and Musical Performance

Austin Emerson. Pulaski St.
Photographic print.

ATHICA@Ciné Gallery presents an exhibition of photographs by Austin Emerson, whose darkroom-based practice centers the alchemy of the process in the resulting images.

By reducing a scene to the bare elements of light and shadow, monochrome photography provides a means of revealing the desires and fears undergirding that scene. Just as the silver halides are washed away to reveal an image during the photo developing process, the photograph washes away the ephemeral impressions of everyday life, offering the opportunity for a changed engagement with the world we inhabit.

— Austin Emerson

This is Emerson’s first solo exhibition for ATHICA. He was selected by the ATHICA Exhibitions Committee to be featured in the Solo Duo Trio series, which provides opportunities for individual artists to exhibit their work at ATHICA and its partner location, ATHICA@Ciné.

About the Artist

Austin Emerson (b. 1991) approaches photography as a means of transforming his relationship with the surrounding environment. In an era where millions of pictures are snapped daily and then never looked at again, the patient process of darkroom printing becomes a meditation, a ritual and an act of defiance against a world premised on speed and disposability. Via this process, dreams, imagination and memory are given space to unfold.

Instagram: @visualblues

Garden of Dreams: Photographs by Austin Emerson is sponsored in part by The James E. and Betty J. Huffer Foundation, The Georgia Council for the Arts, and The National Endowment for the Arts.