Örjan Henriksson, an award winning Swedish photographer, will be showing his Auschwitz KZ I-II photographs alongside new minimalist landscape paintings by Kyle McKenzie, professor of art Missouri Southern University, at James May Gallery October 3rd-28th.

 

Join the artists at James May Gallery for an intimate preview of the exhibition and an Artist Talk on Oct 3rd 7:00 pm. (Dark subject matter- may not be suitable for sensitive viewers/young children)

 

Opening reception: Oct 4th 5:30-8:00pm

 

Additional Details:

About, Örjan Henriksson: 

Örjan Henriksson works include both fine art and commercial photography. He has studied photography with Arnold Newman and George Tice.

Örjan Henriksson’s latest exhibition, Auschwitz KZ I-II, was awarded the Micael Bindefeld Foundation Prize, which was handed out by a member of the Swedish Royal Family, Prince Daniel. The exhibition includes music specially for the exhibition, composed by Pär Gunnarsson and arranged by Örjan Henriksson who also has had a successful career as musician. 

The exhibition opened at Liljevalchs Konsthall in Stockholm and then toured to several museum and art galleries in Sweden.

 

Auschwitz KZ I-II,

“I was exhorted for more than 40 years by my father to learn about the time before the Second World War. This is to recognize the signs of the time, if they would emerge again. To the seemingly beautiful, black and white, tranquil photographs depict a brutal inhumanity became the theme of my work. The suite makes no claim to be documentary, only my personal expressions during the week I spent at Aushwitz camp 1 and 2. My photographs want to portray the emptiness after all those humiliated, tortured, and murdered in Aushwitz. These are no ostentatious images that scream out loud. Instead I let the walls and surfaces depict the total silence that only death leaves behind.” Örjan Henriksson

 

Statement, Kyle McKenzie:

Through painting, I explore the subtlety and solitude found in often-mundane situations and places. In careful observations of light, shadow, and color, I perceive the deceptively complex and beautiful worlds that surround us.

 

These paintings depict the house where I grew up, common family gatherings, patches of ground, and stripped down landscapes. I am drawn to subjects that allow me to ruminate on their subtleties without the intermediaries of direct narrative or symbolism. Through careful and sustained looking, I try to find a fundamental character of the world around me and to reflect that character into the paintings.