CURRENT EXHIBITION

houseguest gallery is thrilled to announce Emma Safir’s exhibition fabric of my Affectionate Memory, opening on September 16th, 2023. Safir’s body of work will be presented as part of the Louisville Photo Biennial. We will be hosting an opening reception from 6-9p on September 16th. We’re excited to announce that additionally, we will be co-hosting an artist talk on the same day with KMAC Contemporary Art Museum from 2-3:45p. Both events are free to the public. 

Emma Safir takes photographs of fabric, of spaces seen through fabric, reflections in windows, privacy glass, naturally occurring moirés found through leaded glass, and fencing. She takes her images out of their context through multiple media and times, cyclically cannibalizing her photos. The reinterpretation and regurgitation that her images go through creates a false sense of indexicality, nodding to the fundamental impossibility of a truly indexical image. This aspect of her process feels deeply indebted to Hito Stereyl and her formative e-flux article, “In Defense of the Poor Image” (2009). As an image exists and gets reposted into digital spaces (and makes its way to printed matter and back) it transforms—its digital language adds a complexity to the image that could not have existed if not for its degradation.