About the Exhibition
Taming Light is a group exhibition of new painting, photography and illustration paying tribute to one of the pre-eminent filmmakers of the 20th Century, Stanley Kubrick.
I work as a film critic and am a Kubrick devotee. I wanted to mark the tenth anniversary of Kubrick’s death in a way that didn’t involve sitting in the dark, watching the films again. I wanted to show how Kubrick’s images, and the eternal emotion behind them, remain a vibrant part of the visual landscape and act as a touchstone, inspiring a new generation of image-makers.
Stanley Kubrick was a great picture-maker – his images are eternal, but more than that, the concepts and emotions behind them endure. He was a filmmaker whose aim was to draw a map of the landscape of the human spirit – the soul and the imagination. Kubrick is more than just a consummate storyteller or technical genius; for the artists paying tribute in this exhibition, he stands as something greater; a genuine film artist; the master of composition, colour, movement and spectacle.
The exhibition is organised on a not-for-profit basis and admission is free. The work on show is not for sale through the exhibition or this website, but privately through the artists’ websites.
John Maguire, October 2009
About the Exhibition Poster
I always felt that Stanley Kubrick had an ominous presence.
I don't mean this in a physical sense -I don't think he was a large man-, or even as an artist; that can't be debated. When I see him photographed on the set I always feel a magnetic presence, like a towering figure presiding over the stage of his creation.
Control was important for Kubrick. These were his films and no-one else's, and the outside elements that were required to complete his vision on film played a part as important as his personal view.
It was this force of personality and intent that influenced my design for the "Taming Light" poster. It was not a matter of whether it should be a portrait of Kubrick, or a collage of elements related to his films; any of this options alone cannot represent both the man and his body of work. So, by pure logic, could the body of the man represent his command of the set and, at the same time, his body of work?
In portraying the images that Kubrick has created, I found there's no room for diversion, no chance to play around. We have accepted them as part of our best experiences as an audience, and as unconscious elements in ourselves. A play, a pun, or any meaningful distortion in portraying his closely stewarded images can only make us remember our original experience, like a souvenir.
I placed myself in the seat of a designer, instead of an illustrator, and let the vision Kubrick guarded so closely fill the shadow of his presence.
Martin Ansin, Montevideo, October 2009
Stanley Kubrick: Taming Light is a non-profit exhibition of new artwork, privately commissioned and curated by John Maguire. No affiliation with The Kubrick Estate, Hobby Films Ltd., Warner Bros. Studios, Turner Broadcasting or Time Warner Corporation (including their subsidiaries or licensees) is implied or should be inferred.
