Jonathan Monk draws upon his conceptual art forbearers using vernacular trappings such as the postcard, slide, and text, yet maintaining a distinctly 21st century spin on his work. Like his predecessors, Monk tackles the serial, reproductive, and the ontological nature of the photograph, but imbues his work with a distinct dose of humor.

The Berlin-based, British-born Monk was recently included in the Tate Triennial 2006 and in Slide Show, curated by Darsie Alexander, at The Baltimore Museum of Art (2005). Shown extensively in Europe as well as at the ICA London (London, England) and Art Gallery of Ontario (Toronto, Canada), he is currently featured in New Photography 2006 at the Museum of Modern Art (New York, NY). Holding degrees from the Glasgow School of Art (Glascow, Scotland) and Leicester Polytechnic (Leicester, England), Monk is represented in the US by Casey Kaplan Gallery (New York, NY).

Statement

In his work, "All the Sizes Available in All The Sizes Available (Manhattan)" (2005), Monk appropriates an image of a Manhattan skyline taken from a commercial photography lab in Berlin where he prints his work. The lab uses this image to advertise to its customers the seven different photograph sizes that they print. Monk asked the lab to print this image in all of the sizes available, in effect, creating a series of tongue-and-cheek photographs that play with the idea of falsified documents.

Darsie Alexander

Darsie Alexander is Senior Curator of Contemporary Art at the Baltimore Museum of Art. She worked as PRC co-editor for VIEWS: New England Journal of Photography and the PRC Newsletter from 1993 to 1995, when she moved to New York, where she was employed in the department of photography at The Museum of Modern Art. While at MoMA, she organized New Photography 14, Robert Cumming: The Clutter of Happenstance and Sets and Situations as well as provided support for Cindy Sherman: The Complete Untitled Film Stills and Manuel Alvarez Bravo.

In 2000, Alexander was hired as Curator of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs at the Baltimore Museum of Art, where she organized the touring exhibition, Slide Show. She is currently organizing a retrospective of Austrian sculptor Franz West. A graduate of Bates College (Lewiston, ME), she earned her MA in art history from Williams College (Williamstown, MA). She was on the 2006 advisory board for the Lucie Awards and participates regularly as a guest juror and portfolio reviewer in national exhibitions and events. Alexander is also on faculty at the Fine Arts School at the University of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia, PA).