Nadine Rovner: The States Project: Pennsylvania

Nadine Rovner: The States Project: Pennsylvania by DeAnn DesiletsApril 24, 2016

©Nadine Rovner

I came across Nadine Rovner’s work last year when I was looking for emerging contemporary photographers in the Philadelphia area who were showing work. Though I never made it to the gallery, I was able to see her series Pivotal on the James Oliver Gallery online gallery, which then connected me to her website and blog. Along with Amy Stevens, Nadine has been nominated as a visual artist at the forefront of contemporary photography by the Silver Eye Center.

What I love most about Nadine’s work is not just how natural each image looks, but knowing how thought out, planned and combed over each image is. The lighting for each image and the cohesive color and framing set the mood and effect for each staged narrative. There is something about this series that strikes a familiar chord with me which is why I am so drawn to it. Memories and nostalgia for my own past experiences from a time of my life comes forward. A time in all our lives when nothing was certain, and the road ahead was filled with endless possibilities.

Nadine Rovner was raised in Southern New Jersey and holds a BFA in Photography from the School of Visual Arts in New York City. She currently works as a fine art and commercial photographer in Philadelphia, PA. She constructs narratives of intimate worlds that bridge her commercial work with a fine art and cinematic quality. With complexity and detail, her richly textured environments and enigmatic characters explore a space filled with tension and vulnerability. Rovner’s work has been exhibited nationally and has been featured in private collections, auctions, and arts fair such as APAID, SCOPE, Photo LA, Art San Diego and Zona Maco Mexico City. Her work has been exhibited in solo and group shows with Gallery 339 in Philadelphia, The Print Center in Philadelphia, James Oliver Gallery in Philadelphia, JDC Fine Art in San Diego, Silvereye Center for Photography, Hous Projects NYC, The University of the Arts, Randall Scott Gallery NYC, and the Humble Arts Foundation.

Through carefully constructed narratives and dramatic portraits, I create intimate worlds that explore a space filled with longing, anticipation, and hope. I work in the tradition of staged photography, beginning with a feeling or concept, and creating a scene to portray it. The conscious choice of clues, signs, and placement of subjects points to the figures absorbed in suspenseful personal dramas. Each element in the frame is orchestrated from the highly choreographed compositions, wardrobes and props to the lighting and saturated colors. Influenced by the complex and detailed worlds created in cinema and short stories, the protagonists in these images leave it up to the viewer to follow the plot line and finish the script. These lush dramas have little overt action, but they contain a palpable sense of tension, like the opening moments of a film, when many things are possible, or the closing sequence where much remains undetermined. The richly textured environments and enigmatic characters suggest hinted fragments of a narrative occurring just outside the frame. The characters explore the idea that identity can be constructed and seem conflicted about what to do with their new-found freedom and responsibility- in essence, where to find home in this next stage of life. The solitude and sense of deliberation that come across in the images suggest that there is no easy road home.