"...it would be difficult to mistake a Slesnick photograph for someone else's. His careful compositions are warmly built with color and humanity. One feels drawn into his images rather than shut out. Instead of designing formal monuments that can only be coldly viewed from afar, Slesnick, as a great architect would, meticulously structures images as places in which one can enter and participate in the realm of life." David C. Swoyer, formerly Curator, New Orleans Museum of Art.
My photographs are taken from my Private Spaces body of work, the goal of which is to document the values of a culture as it is represented in the home and other interior spaces. Since 1987, major emphasis has been placed on the Yucatecan cultures of Mexico, and in the early 2000s, small bodies of work were produced in Cuba and Colombia. In 2005, I returned to working in the United States for the first time in 13 years.
People tend to display in their homes what they value most in life, whether it's a gun collection or family photos and mementos. An enormous amount of information about the people occupying these spaces can be gleaned by studying its contents, and seemingly unimportant details the inhabitants of the spaces have come to ignore all become critically important elements of my work. The result is often what has been called a "peopleless portrait" -- much is learned about an individual without actually seeing him. It's as if the person occupying the space just left the room, but left everything about himself behind, expecting to return momentarily.
Thank you for taking the time to visit my virtual gallery. If you have any comments, questions or suggestions just drop me a note.
So, please sit back and enjoy your trip through Private Spaces.
You
are visitor number
