Sitting in the Silence

Yorba Tasting Room & Gallery presents Sitting in the Silence 

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Arun Patel approaches photography as a dimensional art form. Situation, light, paper, and eye merge to
synthesize a moment in time into the slip of an object. Each of his minimalist images evokes an emotion and
often emphasizes a single subject. A tree, sky meeting ground, atmosphere. Influenced by the principles of
Asian landscape painting, he creates depth with layers, mist and tonality and uses negative space to balance his
compositions. The success of his images is rooted in their quiet, contemplative moods and each one seems to
be a meditation as much as a photograph.

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For this exhibition at Yorba, Patel has selected work that embodies the serenity and rugged nature of the Sierra
foothills and San Joaquin River delta. The crisp cut of winter features prominently with its spare trees, hoary
skies and pre-bud vineyards. Like the deft hand of a poet, he crops and edits his work and then prints on
curated substrates whose textures and weights add evocative value to the images. By employing papers which
might stand as works of art on their own, he brings dimension to each image, rendering what seems flat into the
form of an object. To that end, many photographs are presented unframed, painting-like, so that their surface is
easily recognized as an integral component of the finished whole.

 

The quiet calm of nature features prominently here. Abundant beauty, graceful growth, and the gossamer veil of
light call upon the viewer to pause and sit with these images. It is Patel's hope that viewers will feel a glimmer
of what he felt as he stood in the moment, collaborating with fleeting time, to make them.

Arun Patel is currently engaged in a multi-year project portraying an artistic and personal interpretation of
ancient SE Asian and Indian structures, cultures, and history. His work is documented in photographic editions
and the publication of three books, each one available at Yorba during the exhibition.

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