In Christopher Robin Duncan’s solo show “SEASONS" through July 29 at Rebecca Camacho Presents, the Oakland-based artist presents a series of mixed-media works where disks, in the form of records, cymbals, the sun, and a sundial suggest the progression of time. Most poignantly, the artist takes a long, slow approach, where time unfolds through the rotation of the Earth around the Sun, where months and seasons are key in the artist’s process and metaphor.
At the foundation of Duncan’s work, the artist has developed an innovative process of exposing untreated fabric to sunlight to create photographic-like contact prints. Rather than treating his fabric with the highly light-sensitive silver or iron compounds used in photographic chemistry, Duncan harnesses the intrinsic light-sensitivity of standard dye used in off-the-shelf fabric.
With untraditional materials, Duncan’s process requires months-long exposures, compared to the fractions-of-a-second of most contemporary analogue and digital photography and the minutes of 19th century processes, like cyanotype. Most interestingly, Duncan’s longer, slower approach to time mirrors the pace of the movement of the sun, where time and light coalesce as photographic light source and artistic content...
Genevieve Quick
