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Michael Wolf: The Transparent City
November 6, 2008 - January 31, 2009
Opening reception:
November 6, 5:30 - 7:30pm
SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA-- An exhibition of large-scale color photographs by Michael Wolf will be on
view at Robert Koch Gallery from November 6, 2008, through January 31, 2009. Focusing entirely on the
classic Chicago cityscape, Wolf directs his penetrating lens on an American city for the first time in The
Transparent City. With this work Wolf offers images of human vulnerability coupled with the harsh sterility of
modern life as seen through his unapologetic voyeurism and trademark architectural photographic style.
Following his Real Fake Art series, Wolf simultaneously praises Chicago's historic architecture while exposing it
as a concrete jungle. The urban landscape serves as subject and backdrop for Wolf's voyeuristic exploration.
His prints communicate to the viewer the surreal feeling one has when isolated among millions, and as though
the viewers themselves are in the urban density. Similar to the work of American painter Edward Hopper, Wolf
conveys a mood of confinement and solitude with his pictures. The details in the images allow Wolf to temper
and unsettle how one sees the picture: is it a banal scene, or is something about to erupt? Naturally, Wolf's
concern with the surfaces of these buildings is equally matched with his probing into their interiors. Whether
it's a man drinking Pellegrino at his kitchen counter, or a woman sitting on her couch, Wolf reminds us that an
urban life is one that is always lived in isolation, but nevertheless in the constant company of others. This is all
the more enhanced by Wolf's capturing of people at home or at work as they watch television, speak on the
phone, surf the internet, or concurrently engage in all of these activities. They are in constant communication,
but are still alone.
Wolf lofts purely visual reporting on contemporary urban living in The Transparent City above sheer
documentation. As Natasha Egan, associate director and curator at the Museum of Contemporary
Photography, Columbia College of Chicago, has remarked, Wolf "looks through the multiple layers of glass to
reveal the social constructs of living and working in an urban environment... explor[ing] the complex and
sometimes blurred distinctions between public and private life in a city made transparent by his intense
observation." The result is a brilliantly crafted overlapping of intimate and panoptic viewing brought to life and
immediately paused for our consideration.
Born in Munich in 1954, Michael Wolf was raised in the United States and Germany. He studied at UC
Berkeley before earning a degree from the University of Essen as a student of Otto Steinert. Wolf is the
recipient of the 2005 World Press Photo Award and the American Photography Award. His work has been
exhibited at the Museum of Contemporary Photography in Chicago, Deutsches Architektur Museum in Frankfurt,
Museum der Arbeit in Hamburg, and Bauhaus Museum in Dessau. Wolf's photographs are also included in
prestigious collections both domestically and abroad at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Brooklyn Museum,
Deutsches Architektur Museum, Milwaukee Art Museum, and Museum Folkwang, Essen. Wolf's work is
currently on view at MASS MoCA, and his installation, The Real Toy Story, will be shown at the Shanghai
Biennale in September 2008. The Transparent City is also the subject of a new book of the same title copublished
by the Museum of Contemporary Photography, Columbia College of Chicago and Aperture Gallery in
New York.
For more information, please contact Adam Glick at 415.421.0122 or email press@kochgallery.com .
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