September 1, 2021—October 30, 2021 | Online Exhibition

James Harris Gallery is pleased to present our first exhibition of photographs by New York artist Luke Kempton Williams. Titled “OMENS,” the show features 13 images, all from the West Coast and taken over a twelve-month period of pandemic isolation and re-emergence in a changed world. In some, the subject is nearly unrecognizable, filtered by particular intimate perspective that gives primacy to the formal and haptic qualities of the image. In others, the subject depicts a landscape absent of the human figure yet marred or controlled by it. The pictures become poems of angst, desperation, isolation and abandonment. The works in “OMENS” act as an episodic narrative, a dystopian chronicle of the human condition. Smoke, smoldering fires, and water emphasize the power of nature and its renewal. Broken glass, a sign with bullet holes, and trash heaps echo the violence and chaos of human behavior. “Room With A View” depicts a rusted sign purposely cropped the image to obscure the words. Upon closer inspection, two bullet holes reveal a desert landscape beyond. The sign, now functionless, acts as a portal into an equally desolate world on the other side. In another work, “Hello, My Name Is God,” acidic orange smoke floats above rippling water creating a nether worldly scene. Williams is adept at showing us a world that is off balance both physically and psychologically. This conflict is emphasized by his use of lighting and colored gels to create chromatic aberrations and imbue a work with the atmosphere of a psychosis. Each of the photographs in “OMENS” are pregnant with a tension that alludes to something that’s just happened, or is about to unfold before our eyes.

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