Saul Fletcher | Four Loom Weaver

About

Fletcher’s work transcends photography; his studio wall acts as a canvas on which he paints with broad, lush strokes. Figures and symbols are drawn in rough black line. Found objects—sticks, shoes, and even an umbrella—become elements and subjects in his compositions. As these iterations of the wall are composed and photographed, an intimate light permeates. When human subjects appear, the painted wall is their backdrop; equally composed for and around the person.

These deeply personal works contain symbols and artifacts from Fletcher’s past. A self-taught photographer who worked for many years loading coal on the docks of Hull, the raw, visceral surfaces contained in each photograph seem to mirror and mine his own history and psychology as well as that of such a historically charged place as Berlin. The very nature of these works is surprisingly intimate, granting the viewer access to a normally sacrosanct space, the studio of an artist. Traces of his process appear as dust and detritus. Contained in each of these small-format, intricately sized works are magnitudes of emotion and psychological depth.