ongoing project

Small images are having their moment. Many of the photographs we see on a daily basis fit within the confines of a black mirror in our hands.  You can scroll through hundreds of pictures in minutes on social media. The images have the potential to reach and influence millions of people quickly. More than ever, size does matter.

Small postcards transcended visual communication early in the 20th century, just likes GIFs or memes do today. The effect is relatively the same; mass dissemination about a subject or place. Over the last couple of years, I’ve been inspired by those early photo-chromolithography postcards and their idealized pictorial nature. Much like Instagram today, these stylistic images can curate the notion of envy. An exotic location shared, the message often embellished.

This project, Eternal Flame, uses traditional film photographs manipulated in Photoshop. In an age of post-truth, I’m literally performing post on truth. Fire elements sourced from Google searches transform the traditional photographs into a painting of sorts. Just like photo-chromolithographic images, with their strategically enhanced sunsets, this series provokes more emotion than it does reality. No, Los Angeles isn’t on fire, but metaphorically, it feels that way.

People come to Los Angeles to chase their dreams. The city has always provided hope, like an eternal flame, that fails to extinguish. Sitting on the shores of the Pacific, the myth of the American West can’t go any further than California. Whether a flicker of hope spreads like wildfire is a story yet to be written.

Jimmy DeFlippo

2017

Image Size: 7 x 5 5/8 in. (17.78 x 14.29 cm)

Archival Pigment Prints

On reverse, Ink on label, signed, dated

Printed on Hahnemühle Photo Rag Satin Paper, 310 gsm