Reveal: Three Monographs

“The human heart has hidden treasures,
In secret kept, in silence sealed;
The thoughts, the hopes, the dreams, the pleasures,
Whose charms were broken if revealed.”
― Charlotte Brontë

By Elin Spring

Here at What Will You Remember?, we like to compose themed, comparative book reviews. Fortunately, we are not alone in seeking unifying threads between photobooks. For some time, Yoffy Press has been creating three-monograph sets based around a theme. Their most recent offering “REVEAL” includes volumes by Cig Harvey, Andrea Modica, and Debbie Fleming Caffery. The set “considers what the photograph exposes and what it keeps secret, what the viewer is meant to know and what the artist wants to hold close.”  Yoffy has assembled a splendid suite: Harvey, Modica and Caffery reveal three unique perspectives with beguiling allure.

Spread from Reveal monograph by Cig Harvey (Yoffy Press, 2020). Photo by Elin Spring.

Spread from Reveal monograph by Andrea Modica (Yoffy Press, 2020). Photo by Elin Spring.

Spread from Reveal monograph by Debbie Fleming Caffery (Yoffy Press, 2020). Photo by Elin Spring.

“Pink Curtains” by Cig Harvey from the monograph Reveal (Yoffy Press, 2020).

Cig Harvey’s photographs are awash in color and emotion. She avows, “red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet, I am yours, to have and to hold, to love and to cherish, till death do us part.” In vibrant, saturated hues or fragile, muted palettes, Harvey floods the senses. Her images are mostly portraits of women and girls, in a sidelong examination of identity. They are often partially veiled by windows whispering with ambient reflections or windswept rain. Other times, her subjects are obscured by lacy curtains of flowers or lush bolts of fabric. And sometimes, we behold their steady gaze. Whether we are observing obliquely or directly, Harvey calibrates the tenor of each image with color, and always, mood reigns.

“Emily, 2016” by Cig Harvey from the monograph Reveal (Yoffy Press, 2020).

“Kendall, 2014” by Cig Harvey from the monograph Reveal (Yoffy Press, 2020).

From the series “Best Friends” by Andrea Modica, in the monograph Reveal (Yoffy Press, 2020).

The origins of Andrea Modica’s large-format, B&W portraits of teenaged best friends are at once unanticipated and unsurprising. During an artistic residence at a Connecticut boarding school, Modica intended to make individual portraits, but noticed that her subjects kept showing up for photo sessions with their best friends. She seized on serendipity. In portraits against bare, naturally-lit, mostly outdoor spaces, Modica capitalizes on the extended interactions required by her 8”x10” view camera, developing a rare level of connection and collaboration that defines her images. The teen pairs pose together in a ritualistic dance as old as the ages, appearing intensely intimate yet unsure and guarded. Modica’s study of boys, girls, Americans and Italians transcends gender, culture and era in “the emergence of power struggles that often occurred in front of the camera.” The psychological drama poised just below the surface is positively transfixing.

From the series “Best Friends” by Andrea Modica, in the monograph Reveal (Yoffy Press, 2020).

From the series “Best Friends” by Andrea Modica, in the monograph Reveal (Yoffy Press, 2020).

“Irma” by Debbie Fleming Caffery from the monograph Reveal (Yoffy Press, 2020).

Photograph by Debbie Fleming Caffery from the monograph Reveal (Yoffy Press, 2020).

Debbie Fleming Caffery’s mysterious, sometimes menacing B&W photographs distort the time-space continuum. Dark, grainy, and high-contrast images from several bodies of work, including portraits, interiors, and landscapes all look like they emerged surreptitiously at 3am. Caffery seems intent on obscuring the viewer’s sense of discrimination and context, substituting instead an insistent, vertiginous secrecy. The impenetrable blacks and glaring whites, along with Caffery’s style of blurring or slicing out information, convey her subjects with an abundance of shadows, smoke, fire, and taciturn skies. A mistress of illusion, she’ll employ shimmering or trailing lights to shroud faces, transmitting a powerful sense of spirituality. Caffery’s photographs conspire to reveal the skinniest part of a tale that will enthrall us.

“Lightning Face” by Debbie Fleming Caffery from the monograph Reveal (Yoffy Press, 2020).

“Good Luck Bird” by Debbie Fleming Caffery from the monograph Reveal (Yoffy Press, 2020).

Debbie Fleming Caffery’s B&W photographs possess a dark otherworldliness. Their turbulence and uncertainty conceal more than they reveal, summoning viewers into conspiratorial secrecy. In contrast, Andrea Modica’s portraits are clearly contextualized and possess an emotional scope mirrored in her full B&W tonal range. At once cerebral and intuitive, Modica’s images are layered with nuance, expressing her keen sensitivity to the intensity and drama of adolescent relationships. Cig Harvey’s photographs embrace mystery and wonder, coupling them to femininity and nature in her color-drenched compositions. Harvey’s devotion to the visual spectrum endows her literal and figurative reflections with quenching beauty and emotional magnetism. In “REVEAL”, Yoffy Press has assembled a treasure trove of enticing images that are at once distinctively individual and intuitively related.

From the series “Best Friends” by Andrea Modica, in the monograph Reveal (Yoffy Press, 2020).

“Dahlias” by Cig Harvey from the monograph Reveal (Yoffy Press, 2020).

For more information or to order, go to: http://www.yoffypress.com/reveal