Edward Weston (1886-1958) is considered one of the most influential photographers of the last century. In several hundred works taken between 1934 and 1945, he photographed Charis Wilson (1914-2009), who was his wife from 1939 to 1946. The relationship between model and photographer is just as much a focus of Kelli Connell's (*1974) work as gender and identity issues. She examines Weston's work from a feminist and queer perspective. Her photo series Pictures for Charis was created in the same places where Weston photographed Wilson 80 years earlier. As a model, Connell used her partner, the sculptor Betty Odom (*1980). The Cleveland Museum of Art juxtaposes Connell's and Weston's works. The exhibition Kelli Connell: Pictures for Charis opens on January 26 and closes on May 25. Admission is free.
The starting point for the photo series was not Weston's famous photographs, but Connell's interest in Charis Wilson, who was primarily a writer. Connell examines the obstacles faced by women at different times in standing on their own two feet as artists and critically addresses the desire in the relationship between photographer and photographed subject. In doing so, she refers to both models and landscapes. At the same time, Connell, who teaches at Columbia College Chicago, presents a completely new work for her oeuvre, in which she combines image and text into a narrative for the first time in the photo book. She draws on various texts by Wilson, including her autobiography Through Another Lens: My Life with Edward Weston, which was published in 1998.
