The 2011 series Sides was part of an exhibition that included a video and large flag stitched together from oily rags discarded by workers at the dry dock where the photographs were also taken. They show details of the hulls of ships being repainted in the dry dock. At first sight they look like abstract paintings and in a sense they are: Abstract paintings discovered in the wild. Only a closer look reveals more details that betray the photographic origin of the image. These photographs are presented in pairs with each pair showing two very similar but subtly different images, in fact the two sides of the hulls, starboard and port. The effect is of an image bisected, a slight shift or displacement that is mildly disconcerting and lends an unexpected tension to the experience, as if these were stereoscopic images meant to be somehow merged. The pieces also document different stages of the painters’ work, from the first stage where patches of primer paint have been applied to cover the most worn parts to the final, finishing coat. In the former, we can still see a lot of detail in the worn sections of older paint but in the latter we are presented with flat areas of colour where the only detail is in the welds and small bumps in the steel plates – the image has become more abstract and impersonal. A further complication lies in the fact that each frame is split horizontally across the middle with one colour above and another below. On the ship this marks the waterline but in the images the effect is of a painterly decision, a deliberate, Rothko-like device to enhance our experience of the colour fields. It is surprising that so much can be packed into what would seem to be perfectly simple photographs of something our gaze would normally hardly register but this is precisely what makes Hrafnkell’s approach so captivating. The photographs don’t show anything new or unexpected, no hidden aspect of our world or unique moment, and there is no trick involved. Rather, their fascination lies in how they play on our perception and what they reveal about how our gaze orients our visual world.

sides v
2012
two colour photographs
156 × 125 cm each

sides iii
2012
two colour photographs
156 × 125 cm each

sides i
2012
two colour photographs
156 × 125 cm each

sides ii
2012
two colour photographs
156 × 125 cm each

sides iv
2012
two colour photographs
156 × 125 cm each