2004
Printed by Rosemary Kress; plates made by Jon Goodman
Photogravure on Somerset paper
13 x 10 3/16 in
Smith College Museum of Art
SC 2005:2-5
Purchased with the Fund in Honor of Charles Chetham

Tom Baril has manipulated a contemporary image to resemble one much older, adding a certain aura to a banal location. Baril’s depiction of a factory with four monumental smoke stacks harkens back to the early twenty-century fascination with the machine aesthetic and the optimism surrounding a quickly industrializing world.  By processing the image through an antiquated technique of the nineteenth century, a sepia-toned photogravure, Baril seeks add a timelessness to his image, evoking a romanticized past. Yet, the simple geometric forms of this utilitarian structure, presented in a majestic and grand approach, is akin to the images used in the 20th century by Le Corbusier in his quest to define a path for modern architecture. The word “Variation” in the title further recalls an early twentieth century preoccupation with connecting the visual arts with music. Nonetheless, when looked at closely, the viewer notices small hints of the factory’s demise in the twenty-first century: the graffitied walls, the broken windows of the factory, the post-war street lamp on the left, and the contrasting sleek skyscraper in the background. Together, Baril offers the viewer a complex depiction of a surviving factory in the twenty-first century.

-Elizabeth Gouin


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