With a title referencing the mischievous fun of scrawled bathroom graffiti, reading “For a good time call…,” Eric T. White’s new photographic series For A Good Time is a lighthearted and innovative reimagining of the classic nude photograph. Drawing on his own creative childhood play with basic household materials, the series employs bold monochrome seamless reams of paper found in the studio as a minimal yet evocative prop, hiding and revealing various parts of the body through careful draping and cutting of the paper. Through simplified lighting, colors and backgrounds, the subjects’ bodies are stripped from their context, appearing almost abstract. Combining a surreal Pop aesthetic with a palpable sense of spontaneity, the series transforms the nude body into a temporary readymade sculpture, only preserved permanently through photography.
Through his hundreds of vibrant photographic collages, his sculptural nudes in his recent series For A Good Time and his frequent editorial work for magazines such as New York Magazine, Nylon and Paper, New York-based photographer Eric T. White experiments with the possibilities and the limits of the medium, treating photography as a mixed media. Growing up with a lifelong passion for photography, White decided to pursue a career in photography after the death of his uncle who left all his cameras to his nephew. Fascinated by the photographic process while stripping down his own techniques to their basics, White almost exclusively uses on-camera flash, creating a consistent edgy and bold aesthetic through his entire body of work. Not only connecting the various aspects of his unique work, White’s uncomplicated process also allows for the possibility for increased compositional innovation, preserving fleeting playful moments with the lens of his camera. With art historical references from Surrealism to Dada to Pop Art appearing in his work, White’s photography captures the powerful beauty of portraiture whether fracturing the human body through eye-catching collage or redefining the nude through fascinating sculptural forms.
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