Carrie Levy at Daniel Cooney Fine Art

 

Carrie Levy is one of the few people I know who is successfully straddling both a career as a photo editor and teacher and that of an artist with regular, well-deserved shows..I've followed her work with interest for years-- she is also a friend, and we've been co-workers, going as far back as our days at Newsweek magazine.

In general I really don't like nudes, but what Carrie is doing is different. There is an undercurrent in the work that keeps me coming back, and looking closer. The new work is no exception. What I see here is a mish-mash of intense intimacy, fear, penetration, drowning, trust..

Carrie Levy writes about this series:
"You Before All questions the line that separates pain from pleasure. The work magnifies how in the moment it is hard to decipher between these two very different emotions. Both are intense, but are very much the opposite of another. The aim in this body of work is to ask the viewer to uncover which one of these emotions is behind a single frame and where he or she is more sympathetic. Throughout the series, my role as the photographer is to play the part of the predator. I contort my subjects to look like victims. However, whether they are victims of pain or pleasure is up to the viewer to decide....
One of the themes of this work is about collecting and archiving images of men. Therefore who ever is willing to sit in front of my lens is welcomed. At the moment there are over 50 subjects in the full series."

You can see her work in person right now at Daniel Cooney Fine Art, at 511 West 25th Street, Suite 506.