Untitled (Cape Cod, Massachusetts, USA) by Carlo van de Roer

Water obviously has many many symbolic functions, particularly in ways relating to our bodies. The work of Carlo van de Roer, however, is compelling because of the water that’s missing. The emptied swimming pools he photographs are rich with history, to the point of being ghostly. The residue of their past heightens the sense of  uselessness, yet the pools retain an eerie dignity that is unexpected. Each space becomes individual, without the homogenizing liquid veneer.

I think Carlo can describe it much better than me:

When full, the surface of a swimming pool is a flat continuation of the pool edge, obscuring what is below the surface. When drained, the depths are revealed — allowing us to examine the empty pool postmortem.
These locations were once bustling social environments, and visiting them was a collective, public experience. Now deserted by swimmers, the experience of visiting these pools is solitary, still and private. Some have become bogs, homes or gardens — new lives that often go unobserved. Photographing them can be a voyeuristic and dark experience. I have focused on an intimate view of these locations, using tight crops which also emphasize the absent, making these photos as much about what is not there as what is there.

Thanks, Carlo! And fer the rest of yous, come and jump in our pool before time runs out! (too much?)

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 1st, 2007 at 7:24 am by niki and is filed under Contenders, Fall '07 Hot Shots. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.