Jonathan Lewis (born 1970, London) lives and works in New Jersey, USA. He makes photo-based art that explores themes of visual memory and modern communication via the elemental properties of the pixel and the low-fi aesthetic of the screen-grab. His subjects, ranging from candy wrappers and emojis to haute couture and works of art reflect an uncritical fascination for the artificial and the man-made. His process, often pixelating images beyond recognition, criss crosses the border between figuration and abstraction, and his work takes the form of digital prints, sculpture, video, books, and painting. He is a founding member of the
ABC Artists' Books Cooperative ABC Artists’ Books Cooperative is an international network created by and for artists who make print-on-demand books. Founded in 2009 by German artist Joachim Schmid, the cooperative participates in book fairs and exhibitions predominantly in Euro ...
.
Exhibition highlights include 'Signs of a Struggle: Photography in the Wake of Postmodernism' at the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK in 2011, and a two-person show, 'Mosaico', with the American photographer
John Pfahl at Nina Freudenheim Gallery, Buffalo, USA in 2012. Other museum shows include 'Sight Reading: Photography and the Legible World' (2016) at the
Morgan Library & Museum
The Morgan Library & Museum, formerly the Pierpont Morgan Library, is a museum and research library in the Murray Hill neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. It is situated at 225 Madison Avenue, between 36th Street to the south and 37th S ...
, New York, which presented his Pixles series based on Beatles album covers, and 'Fiction and Fabrication: Photography of Architecture after the Digital Turn' (2019) at MAAT, Lisbon, Portugal, which showed pictures from his Designer Labels series.
Lewis's work is held in a number of public collections including the
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) is an art museum located in Midtown Manhattan, New York City, on 53rd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.
It plays a major role in developing and collecting modern art, and is often identified as one of ...
, New York, USA;
Victoria and Albert Museum
The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...
, London, UK;
Société Française de Photographie
The Société française de photographie (SFP) is an association, founded on 15 November 1854, devoted to the history of photography. It has a large collection of photographs and old cameras.
Among the founding members were Olympe Aguado, Hippoly ...
, Paris, France; Novo Banco Collection of Contemporary Photography, Lisbon, Portugal;
Cleveland Museum of Art
The Cleveland Museum of Art (CMA) is an art museum in Cleveland, Ohio, located in the Wade Park District, in the University Circle neighborhood on the city's east side. Internationally renowned for its substantial holdings of Asian and Egyptian ...
, Cleveland, OH;
George Eastman House International Museum of Photography and Film, Rochester, New York, USA.
[https://collections.eastman.org/people/49293/jonathan-lewis/objects]
Publications
*David Evans
Wasting Time on the Internet, Elephant Magazine, February 6, 2018
*Robert Shore
The art of the steal: When does a copyright go too far?, CNN Style, November 23, 2017
*Tom Sowden, Ruscha Rip-Off, Rip-Out, Afterimage, Vol 37 No 6, Rochester, USA, 2010.
*Steven Ceuppens, Space Invaders, Extra Magazine Fotomuseum Antwerp, Netherlands, Summer 2008.
*Caroline Cunningham, Cracking The Bar Code, House and Garden, USA, March 2004.
*Kim Zorn Caputo
Blind Spot Magazine, Issue 18, New York, USA, 2001.
References
External links
Official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Lewis, Jonathan
1970 births
Living people
English artists
American digital artists
British digital artists