the new life

BY WALL DONE, 04/08/2010

In 2003, Lise Sarfati journeyed through the United States, photographing young adults in the context of their solitary lives in towns such as Austin, Texas; Berkeley, California; Portland, Oregon; and New Orleans, Louisiana. The photographs dramatize the complex emotional states of mind that lie close beneath the surface of her subjects. With minimal choreography, Sarfati activates connections with her subjects in their everyday spaces and situations – bedrooms, backyards, kitchens, grocery stores.

The charged strangeness of the photographs in The New Life parallels an earlier body of work Sarfati made in Russia during the 1990s. While the geographic, socioeconomic, and political contexts are entirely unique, the suggested narrative of isolation links this body of work with the Russian series. Sarfati avoids nostalgia with respect to her young subjects, identifying instead with their out-of-place feelings.

All images © Lise Sarfati

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