Jack Chambers, 401 Towards London No. 1 (La 401 vers London nº 1), 1968-1969 Huile sur bois, 183 x 244 cm, Musée des beaux-arts de l’Ontario, Toronto
“Perceptual realism” is Chambers’s term for what art should be—that is, a profound reflection on primary sensory experience, not simply a reproduction of it. As if to show that he was not simply copying what the eye and camera could see, Chambers changed many details during the long inception of this work, not least the signposting on the highway. He maintained a distance from the mechanical precision of the photograph, resulting in a sublime unreality that emanates from this image.
This Spotlight is excerpted from Jack Chambers: Life & Work by Mark A. Cheetham.
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