Robert ParkeHarrison at George Eastman House - Rochester, N.Y

The eccentric character who inhabits Robert ParkeHarrison's photographs is none other than the artist himself. The American photographer designs and constructs the sets for his photo-based works, and then assumes the role of a heroic Everyman figure fighting environmental battles against impossible odds. His scenes are realized through a fairly complex process of hand-painted combination prints constructed from multiple, enlarged paper negatives. The process, devised by the artist, enables him to manipulate scale, depth and repetition to create illusionary landscapes and manic performances.

In the first major museum exhibition to address ParkeHarrison's ambitious production, the viewer is offered a rare glimpse into his sources and working methods. The show, which resumes its tour later this year, opens with an interpretive gallery in which the artist arranges many of his extant props in an open diorama--including a pair of dramatically oversized scissors, wooden wings outfitted for human flight, and his own dark suit, which he wears in all of his tableaux. Also on view are his selections from the Eastman House permanent collection, photographs ranging from Timothy O'Sullivan and Henry Peach Robinson to Dieter Appelt and Tseng Kwong Chi, identifying the major influences and processes that contributed to his own photographic work.

The exhibition offers an impressive survey--some 45 pieces made between 1997 and 2000--illuminating the artist's shift from bleak, postapocalyptic nightmares to more expansive landscapes shaped by human ingenuity and sacrifice. While the earlier series have the Everyman engaged in such desperate acts as cobbling together a breathing contraption, more recent pieces find him in less perilous situations, focusing his efforts on restoring and listening to the earth. In all of the works, ParkeHarrison demonstrates an ability to distill and redress complex environmental problems and failed technological systems with resourcefulness and dark humor. In The Exchange (1999, 40 by 45 inches), the Everyman offers sustenance to a collection of dying plants through tubes connected to his own veins. In Tree Stories (2000), he patiently transcribes the accounts of felled trees that are piled up around him, as communicated through a set of headphones wired to the tree trunks. Everyman's tireless laboring suggests a larger metaphor for creative production and the work involved in communicating through objects and images. ParkeHarrison's perseverance matches that of his Everyman, and the integrity of the work is expressed in his own unique and painstaking process.

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