May 11-14, 2023
Booth D9
Photo London 2023
Works by Itamar Freed & Kristina ChanBooth D9
Catalogue editors: Orit Ephrat-Moscovitz, Hadas Glazer
Design: Moria Bachar
Photography: Youval Hai (Installation images)
Measurements are given in centimeters, height x length
Cover: Detail, Dream in Blue, 2019
Inside cover: Detail, Orange Tree, 2019
Litvak Contemporary
3 Shvil Hamifal Street, Tel Aviv 66535, ISRAEL
+972-3-7163897
www.litvakcontemporary.com
© 2023 All rights reserved to Litvak Contemporary, Tel Aviv
Photo London 2023
Works by Itamar Freed & Kristina Chan
Curator: Hadas Glazer
Itamar Freed and Kristina Chan present photographic works that search for the idea of realness in the natural world. Influenced by post-impressionism, ideas surrounding the classification and preservation of historical artifacts, nature, and Japanese printing techniques, the works question the veracity of the photograph in the interplay between the real and the fantastic. As in a lucid dream, the artists control the narrative, characters and environment in the depicted landscapes. The works are digitally and analogously manipulated, combining both curated environments (such as museums, zoos, and digital materials) along with nature photography to question verisimilitude and how we shape our memories and concepts of nature. The photographs include cyanotypes printed on hand-made Japanese paper, lithographs, etchings, and pigment prints. The artists utilise both historic and contemporary techniques to decontextualise the image and our expectations of how these traditional techniques can be presented.
The artist’s studios are varying environments, shifting between the darkroom, print studio and nature itself. As a duo, the artists work together, documenting wildness and seasons across the globe. The exchange takes place virtually as well as physically, forming a hybrid practice that opens
up a space for reinterpretation and conversation about how nature is conveyed to us and represented differently across the planet artificially and naturally.
This body of work invites reflection on the generosity, beauty and continuity of nature. It is a study of aesthetics through an empathy for nature, a celebration of nature.
Itamar Freed
Itamar Freed (born in Manhattan, 1987) lives and works between Brisbane, London, Tel Aviv and New York. His work has been showcased in solo and group exhibitions worldwide, including Museum of London, London Nights; Royal Academy, London; Royal Photographic Society, Bristol; Offprint TATE, TATE Modern, London; BEERS London Gallery (solo show); Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh; Pulse Miami, Volta New York, Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair, London; Grosvenor House, Christie’s Auction House, Hancock Gallery, Newcastle; Photo LA, NordArt, Germany; Photo Israel, Haifa Musuem of Art, Ramat Gan Museum of Art, FireWorks Gallery, Brisbane; Untitled Art Fair Miami Beach.
Freed has an MA in photography from the Royal College of Art, London 2018 and received his BFA Photography Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design Jerusalem 2012. He was the 2016 recipient of the Clore Duffield Foundation Scholarship for a Masters degree at the Royal College of Art valued over 70,000 GBP. Among the many awards he has received are the Travers Smith 2021/2022 CSR Art Awards Alumni Artist, London; BEERS London Summer Marathon 2020, London; “EPSON” first prize for excellence in the art of photography, 2012. Freed also received an award of $10,000 AUD to exhibit his work at Sculpture by the Sea, Sydney, Australia, 2018. Freed was selected for the 2019 Airie - Artist in Residence in Everglades Program in the Everglades National Park, Florida, USA and the BigCi Artist Residency Program, Sydney, Australia, 2017.
Currently, Freed is working toward a solo show in the Kyneton Contemporary Art Triennial, Victoria, Australia, 2025.
Freed’s works are included in numerous private collections worldwide as well as major public collections such as JP Morgan Chase Art Collection, USA; The Estee Lauder art collection, USA; The Clore Collection, UK; the US. Department of State Collection, USA; Lauren and Mitchell Presser Photography Collection, USA; and other private collections.
Freed’s photographic works search for the idea of realness in the natural world. His practice examines the discreteness of three domains: the wild and uninhabited natural habitat; the cultural landscape of the city; and the staged environment. Freed is interested in representation and how images of places may come to displace or augment our understanding and memory of them. He is concerned with disappearing terrains, but also with vanishing notions of realness—whether in the form of a simulated environment or a digital photograph of unknown veracity. In his practice, he explores how we come to understand what is “real” and how we imagine the places we have never been. Freed’s work is about the way we learn to look at the world around us and the way we use our collective memory and language.
Kristina Chan
Kristina Chan (b. Vancouver, Canada; 1991) is a UK based artist living and working in London. Her practice utilises narrative and site specificity to evoke a felt history. She works between traditional printmaking processes and alternative photography to create large scale public installations focusing on local histories. and sense of place.
Chan graduated from the Royal College of Art (MA Print) in 2016 and receiver her BFA from Parsons The New School (Paris/New York, 2013). She has exhibited globally, most notably at the Musee du Louvre during the 5th Annual Exposure Award Black and White Collection, Royal Photographic Society (2022-2023); Offprint TATE at TATE Modern (2015, 2016, 2018), Royal Academy London (2019, 2020, 2021), Hancock Gallery (2023, 2021); Beers London (2020), Photo LA (2020), Photo IS:RAEL (2020), Royal Academy of Art Antwerp during the 1st Edition of the KoMASK Master Printmaking Salon (2017), Oseana Kunst ogKultursenter Bergen (2018), Museum für Moderne Kunst Bremen, Mindepartementet Museum of Art and Photography
Stockholm, Hellingkreuzer HOF Venna (all 2016), LitvakContemporary Tel Aviv, Israel (2022, 2019), Anise Gallery (2018, 2016) and Mall Galleries London (2017), Royal ScottishAcademy
Edinburgh (2019, 2018, 2019,2020), and Project 88 Mumbai (2016), to name a few.
Chan has works in the permanent archives of the V&A Museum (2016, 2017, Ingram Collection (2020) and Royal Collection, Clarence House (2018). She won the Canada Council for the Arts (CCA) Explore & Create Grant (2021), CCA Digital Originals Innovation Award, Ingram Prize and is a Queen Sonja Print Award Finalist (all 2020). She is a two-time recipient of the Elizabeth Greenshield’s Foundation Project Grant (2017, 2018), 1st place winner of the Royal Society of Painter Printmakers RE Anthony Dawson Printmakers Prize, Royal Scottish Academy RSA Guthrie Award, Wyng Media Award WMA Public Commission Finalist (all 2017), Villiers David Travel Grant (2015), Canadian General Governor’s Award for Excellence (2010), Government of Canada’s Millennium Award (2009).
Inquire
Dream in Blue, 2019
Cyanotype on Tosa Wasa handmade Japanese paper
78 x 58 each
Inquire
Peacock, 2019
Photography, inkjet pigment print on archival
Kozo Japanese paper
175 x 110
Inquire
Barred Owl, 2019
Photography, inkjet pigment print on archival Kozo Japanese paper
110 x 110
Inquire
Cyanotype on Tosa Wasa handmade Japanese paper 60 x 70
Inquire
Inquire
Orange Tree, 2019
Photography, inkjet pigment print on archival Kozo Japanese paper
110 x 133
Inquire
Oh Deer 2019
Photography, inkjet pigment print on archival Kozo Japanese paper
137 x 90 each
Inquire Far North, 2022
Pigment print on archival Japanese paper
165 x 110
Inquire
Another Time, 2022
Multimedia: Lithographic mono print with stencilling
70 x 70
Inquire
Cyanotype on Tosa Wasa handmade Japanese paper 30 x 30
Inquire
Pinholes 2, 2021
Cyanotype on Tosa Wasa handmade Japanese paper 30 x 30