States of Grace

Southwest Blvd, KC

Waffle House

Eli

Here is another small selection from a new series I am working on called States of Grace.

STATE:

1. the condition of a person or thing, as with respect to circumstances or attributes: a state of health.

2. a particular condition of mind or feeling: to be in an excited state.

3. an abnormally tense, nervous, or perturbed condition: He's been in a state since hearing about his brother's death.

4. a politically unified people occupying a definite territory; nation.

GRACE:

1. elegance or beauty of form, manner, motion, or action.

2. favor or good will.

3. mercy; clemency; pardon: an act of grace.

4. favor shown in granting a delay or temporary immunity.

5. an allowance of time after a debt or bill has become payable granted to the debtor before suit can be brought against him or her or a penalty applied: The life insurance premium is due today, but we have 31 days' grace before the policy lapses.

6. the influence or spirit of God operating in humans to regenerate or strengthen them.

White House

White House, MO

White House, KS

White House, OK

White House, NM

White House, KS

This is a small selection of photographs from an on-going series called 'White House'. I began working on this project last year. The images were made on several road trips I took at this time, between New York and Arizona.

This photo essay has just been published in JPG Magazine, Issue 20

http://jpgmag.com/stories/11109

WHITE HOUSE:

With the world economy sliding into depression. An astronomical national debt. War and environmental issues reaching crisis point it makes you wonder what kind of White House the new U.S. President will be moving into. These images of White Houses made in the American heartland are a metaphor and meditation on this serious state of affairs.

A slideshow of this series can be seen here:

Voyage of Small Discoveries: Simon Kossoff at {:m Momentum Gallery. An exhibition review.

Lost Boy (II)

Bear, Lawrence, KS

Billboard, Wellsville, KS

Writer and artist Steve Brisendine wrote a review of my recent Running on Empty show for Re-View Magazine (Mid-America's Visual Arts Publication) as part of his excellent and energetic KC Art 365 column: http://ereview.org/category/all-articles/artkc365/

Simon Kossoff
Running on Empty

{:m Momentum Gallery
2014 Main Street
Kansas City, MO
816.560.1450

Hours: First Fridays, 6-9 p.m., Monday 11 a.m.-3 p.m. and by appointment.

"Not to sound the urgency alarm or anything, because Mondays exact a toll as it is, but if you don't get to the {:m Momentum Gallery today, you'll miss the second half of Simon Kossoff's Running on Empty and miss a chance to see this city, this region, this country through the eyes and lens of a recent arrival.

Kossoff, a native of England who now lives in Overland Park, came to the U.S. just in time to see history in the making. Not long after he got here, he started exploring the country.

Instead of presenting the landmarks of America, the things in which we take national pride, Kossoff captured images of kitsch (as in Hobby Lobby, Kansas, today's featured piece). He turned his lens toward our culture of disposability and the chase for easy money. He recorded all of it with an observer's dispassionate eye and an artist's gift for composition that elevates his subject matter above the commonplace.

This is not a show of "pretty pictures". Nor is it an exhibition of in-your-face images chosen for shock value. If there's confrontation in Kossoff's work, it's because he shows us as we are (which is not always how we want to see ourselves). And if there is beauty, and there is, it is not necessarily in the things Kossoff photographs, but in the lines and colors and light that define, outline and shape those things.

These are postcards not from an extended vacation, but from an ongoing quest. And if you get to the gallery before three this afternoon, you can go along for the ride.

By Steve Brisendine August 31, 2009

A link to the published review can be found here. Many thanks Steve. :

http://ereview.org/2009/08/31/voyage-of-small-discoveries-simon-kossoff-at-m-momentum-gallery/

A slideshow of the Running on Empty series can be seen here: