The art of Leah Schrager will be featured in “Unprotected Specs,” an exhibition on view at the Montauk Beach House from July 5 to 17. The show opens with a reception from 6 to 10 p.m. on Friday, July 5 and on view will be 11 visual works in which the artist uses the base image of herself which she digitally alters, enhances, and/or censors. The resulting works are printed on photographic paper or aluminum. On Saturday, July 6, from 1 to 3 p.m., Ms. Schrager will present her performance piece “Angles on a Woman,” a reflection of her process and an investigation of Jacques Derrida’s “Copy, Archive, Signature: A Conversation on Photography,” in which he states that photography is “as much production as recording of images, as much act as gaze, as much performative event as passive archivization.”
Ms. Schrager will also offer an artist talk at noon on Sunday, July 7.
To create her pieces, Ms. Schrager travels to hotels or home rentals where she photographs herself performing for the camera. She then processes the images through selection, touch-up, and digital painting. Finally, she posts the images on various social media platforms.
In her live performance, viewers will see her production process in its three stages—Act I Photoshoot; Act II Processing; Act III Posting. As part of Act III, Ms. Schrager will post her selections to three different Instagram accounts, one of which currently has three million followers.
Living and working in Brooklyn, Ms. Schrager received her MFA in Fine Art from Parsons in 2015. The Montauk Beach House is located at 55 South Elmwood Avenue in Montauk. This summer, her artwork will also be shown at Art on the Edge at Roman Fine Art from July 1 to 28, Market Art + Design in Bridgehampton from July 5 to July 7, and Tabula Rasa, the 26th annual Watermill Center summer benefit and auction on July 27.
Staff Writer on Jun 25, 2019