Robert Raczka

Land and Sea

archival pigment prints, 2005, 29 x 43", printed by Artists Image Resource, Pittsburgh

These photographic images were shot at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History. They were shot without benefit of a tripod or flash, in keeping with the inconvenient but understandable policies of the Museum. With their subjects altered by pictorial distortions including angle of view, selectivity, and compositional emphasis, I feel they stand in relation to the dioramas as an echo of how the dioramas stand in relation to the nature they depict. Much of what we know, we know from representations, rather than from experiencing things more directly. Representations cannot help but distort the things they represent. While this is always worth keeping in mind, this project is intended to offer an appreciation of these dioramas and displays as much as a reminder of the artifice of these and all representations.

Artists Image Resource installation views, 2005