Art Review: Josef Hoflehner at Stephen Cohen Gallery

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Josef Hoflehner’s photographs of commercial jets taking off and landing reveal one of the ways digital imagery has changed the way we see the world -- and not for the better. The tragedy of 9/11 also echoes in these pictures, casting a shadow over their otherwise playful pleasures.

To make nine of the 26 black-and-white prints in his exhibition at Stephen Cohen Gallery, Hoflehner traveled to the Caribbean Island St. Maarten, where the airport’s runways abut city streets and beautiful beaches. In several images, traffic signs warn of the danger of jet engine blast. But the power of the pictures resides in the extreme contrast between planes and humans, who are dwarfed by the aircraft.

The giant planes shrink the distance normally found between foreground and background. You feel the contraction in your gut. The planes are too close for comfort.

Hoflehner’s photos occasionally recall the video footage of the planes that crashed into the World Trade Center. Mostly, though, his images avoid this association by showing planes flying over sandy beaches, where there is no architecture and just a handful of people.

In several works, tourists ham it up. In others, they pay no attention to the noisy planes, having grown accustomed to their presence.

Viewers experience something similar. We are so used to seeing digitally doctored images that the surprise of seeing airliners in unlikely places is not nearly as great as it was when photographs were made on light-sensitive film. Seeing Hoflehner’s work today, your first thought is not ‘Wow! What a strange event captured on film,’ but ‘Hmm, what a pedestrian use of computer manipulation.’

His other images, depicting leafless trees in snowy St. Petersburg, dreamy canals in Venice, and night scenes in L.A., San Francisco and Hong Kong, are less gimmicky and more satisfying. They also rely on dramatic contrasts. But their extreme shifts between light and dark, close and far, street and sky, leave viewers more room to roam.

-- David Pagel

Stephen Cohen Gallery, 7358 Beverly Blvd., (323) 937-5525, through Dec. 30. Closed Sundays and Mondays. www.stephencohengallery.com

Images: Top, Josef Hoflehner, ‘Jet Airliner #09, American Airlines Boeing, St. Maarten;’ Bottom, Josef Hoflehner, ‘Rails, San Francisco, California.’ Credit: Stephen Cohen Gallery