September 7 – October 19, 2007

Reception: Friday, September 7, 7 –10 pm
Curator & Artist Talk: Saturday, September 8, 2 pm

PLATFORM: Centre for Photographic and Digital Arts is pleased to present Soft Ground, a two-person exhibition featuring Elaine Stocki and Sarah Small, curated by Lisa Stinner. Join us Friday September 7th for the opening reception, where Lisa Stinner, and New York-based photographer Sarah Small will be in attendance. A curatorial introduction by Lisa Stinner will be presented Saturday September 8th at 2pm in the gallery, followed by an artist talk with Sarah Small.

Stocki and Small were chosen for the exhibition for their intense, intimate photographs that convey authentic emotion – a departure from the apparent emotional detachment found in much of contemporary photography.

Both artists photograph the figure in staged situations that evoke raw emotion, desires, and drives, and investigate the relationship between the photographer and her subjects. By focusing the exhibition on two artists, the curator creates a direct comparison between the work of Canadian Stocki and American Small, who take different approaches to creating photographs that feature emotionally dense, complicated moments. Both artists approach their work with a youthful, authentic sensibility, drawing upon influences as disparate as Diane Arbus and Garry Winogrand. Contextualizing the work of an emerging Winnipeg artist, Stocki, with the work of New York-based rising star, Small, places both practices in an international arena that reveals universal trends and concerns in fresh ways.

Sarah Small was born in 1979 in Washington, D.C., to two musicians. She spent her high school years photographing her freckled and (usually) cooperative younger sister, Rachel. In 1997, Small began her studies at the Rhode Island School of Design where she was awarded a merit scholarship. Since graduation from RISD in 2001, her images have been showcased in publications including Life Magazine, The New York Times, Visionaire, Surface, Planet, Psychology Today, Playgirl, XLR8R, Resonance, Topic and Shots Magazine. Small has received numerous photography awards and has exhibited in group and solo shows nationally and internationally.

Elaine Stocki was born in 1979 in Winnipeg, MB. Stocki is a recent University of Manitoba BFA graduate, and current student at the Yale MFA photography program. She has had a solo exhibition at GOSA Gallery, University of Manitoba, as well as being involved in several group exhibitions in Winnipeg. Her work has been written about in the Manitoban, the Winnipeg Free Press, The Uniter, and Uptown Magazine.

Lisa Stinner’s photographic work was shown in a solo exhibition at PLATFORM: centre for photographic and digital arts (Winnipeg) in 2007, and will be featured in a two-person exhibition at Gallery 44 (Toronto). Since graduating from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago with her Master of Fine arts Degree in Photography, Stinner’s work has also been featured in several group exhibitions, locally, nationally and internationally. Stinner’s photographs have also been highlighted in several juried publications including Carte Blanch (2006), a compendium of international photographic artists, and Flash Forward (2006), which focuses on emerging international photographers.