The photographs in the series Low Relief depict the skin of the city; surfaces and facades that have been transformed by human interaction and reimagined through subjective perception. Lehr’s approach in making this work included photographing both in the world and in a make-shift studio using natural sunlight and found materials. The prints maintain an uncanny verisimilitude even as they highlight the difference between a photograph and its referent. The gestures embedded in the works are records of physicality that hover in a space between the tactile and the intangible.
John Lehr received a BFA from the Maryland Institute, College of Art and an MFA from Yale University. His work is included in the collections of The Center for Creative Photography, The Denver Art Museum, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Morgan Library and Museum, The Nelson Atkins Museum, and The Yale University Art Gallery. Recent publications include The Island Position (MACK), The Photograph as Contemporary Art (Thames and Hudson), Photography is Magic (Aperture), and El Camino Real (Roman Nvmerals). He lives and works in Elkins Park, PA.