MHU Architecture: 2010

Narrative - Reynolds and his "X-PLORE" lomography gallery

Joshua Reynolds is a photographer and also a university lecturer, by engaging his spare time into travel and the rest dedicated towards his Japanese/French rock fusion music band.
With his strong passion towards cultural exploration, Reynolds established his Lomography gallery/studio in response to the idea of community and culture solidarity - by using lomography artworks to document life through pictures and capture different cultures. The gallery exhibits both local and international lomographers with cultural related themes every month. The gallery itself is a place to hangout and appreciates different cultures, which brings art into the everyday life.

Characteristics of the gallery owner

Joshua Reynolds is in his forties and has worked in the photography industry since he was in his early 20s. Having studied in Australia and worked a few years as a professional photographer, with his strong passion towards contemporary art, he was able to travel and work overseas to broaden his horizons. However after experiencing endeavors of rich culture in Asia and Eastern Europe, Reynolds realized he couldn’t relate to a lot of the bourgeois art in galleries and embarked on the need to field that voice in Australia. By realizing what we were missing out on, Reynolds established his lomography gallery in response to the idea of culture solidarity. Thus the creation of bringing the community in by exhibiting lomography artworks is born. His idea of bringing more communities into the gallery in order to attract a bigger audience whom people in the major art institutions don’t really acknowledge is hence the reason why he chose to open his gallery in New Town for the intermix of cultures and communities. The gallery exhibits local as well as international lomographers with themes exhibitions directed towards a different community every month. Through advertising in segmented, cultural newspapers, Reynolds is able to allow the public to engage in their culture, what it means to live here, and what community and culture means to them. This initiative is seen as an infusion of originality in Reynolds’s aim to engage his audience and work around them, instead of the traditional ‘create an exhibition and target them’ idea. Hence, the only way to attract an engaging audience is so that there is a sense of relation, where art is seen by the public as an elitist, fundamentally driving the owner to bring it down to earth and onto even grounds.

The concept behind the Art Gallery

The photography exhibited in the gallery renders the concepts and ideas revolving culture, in this sense culture is expressed in terms of everyday life, freedom, struggle, survival and social issues. The goal of these artworks is intended to conjure the audience’s thoughts and to make them reflect and relate to the ideas. The common ground is set where viewers from different backgrounds are able to congregate together to share and express their common interests and in return, this highlights the ultimate goal of the gallery to build upon culture solidarity.

Lomography - A creative approach to communicating, absorbing and capturing the world

A camera originally designed by Russian Professor Radionov for use during the cold war, Lomo's purpose was for spy games and international espionage. However, the camera failed its inventors intentions, when it was deemed not precise enough, light enough or small enough for Russian secret agents to carry on assignment.

"New Generation Lomography" was born when two esoteric Austrian art students, Wolfgang Stranzinger and Matthias Fiegl, stumbled across a second-hand Lomo in a Prague junk shop.
Capitalizing on the camera's origins, the pair took shots in true spy style; shooting from the hip, in haphazard directions, to capture their surroundings in a manner that rebelled against the logic of traditional camera composition. The result was a flood of authentic, colourful, crazy, off-the-wall and unfamiliar snapshots. The inspired technology of the seemingly humble camera captured moody shots, which boasted obscure light effects against vibrant color and movement.