D.W. Mellor’s black and whites

There is something about taking the best from the past, reinterpreting it and making a superb example for the present.  This is exactly what American-born photographer D. W. Mellor does in his dossier of photos called Stills.

What’s amazing in the image above is that it echoes a 17^th century Old Master painting in its mood, but in its setting, even though it incorporates old objects, it is a minimalist composition of the 21^st century. And so what makes it a superb contemporary photograph is not the objects themselves and how they enhance the table as it would in the 17^th century, but the relationship of the few arranged objects and how these are defined by the natural light.

Image credit: © D.W. Mellor, Still Life with White Cloth, London, 2000 (2009), 1/10, Iris Print, 26 x 32 in. | 66 x 81.2 cm., US$6,000.  The artist is represented by Robert Burge 20th Century Photographs, New York.