Gypsy

2006 - Photography (Photography)

Pascal Shirley

---

Gypsy shows an ambivalent scene, in which broken blinds and its unsmiling subject are balanced with the stilllife plentitude of watermelon slices and the beautifully lit nudity of the sitter. The room seems messy and in disrepair, but simultaneously romanticizes the scene. The fruit and the sitter suggest a robustness in contrast with the mise-en-scene. This is underscored, even, by a visual pun on the subject’s exposed breast and the lemon pointing towards the camera.

---

Pascal Shirley’s photographs portray a California of beaches, music festivals, families, and hipsters wandering through the hills. Shirley also shoots commercially, and this dual practice is evident in his art photographs. His subjects are often attractive and well-dressed, and his compositions framed and illuminated accordingly. Shirley’s photographs are understood most readily in the context of portrait photography. Many of his images draw the viewer’s attention to the personality and history of the subject.

---

Colors:

---

• disheveled.s.01
• ambivalence.n.01
• mise_en_scene.n.01
• vulnerability.n.01
• openness.n.02
• idealized.s.01
• contemporary realist portraiture
• color photography
• cultural commentary
• calarts