Lakewood, Colorado Possibly 1973 - 1979

This photograph, Lakewood, Colorado, was made by Robert Adams, who was born in 1937. It's a study in grey tones, each shade carefully considered; it’s almost painterly in its attention to composition. Adams is playing with this idea of artmaking as selection, as a way of showing us something significant. The surface of the print is matte, without a sheen, and it's this quality which really draws you in. The eye is pulled back along the shot towards the vanishing point, which sits above stacks of 'Revere Ware' boxes. But it’s those chairs in the foreground that really stay with me. Their homely, dated upholstery evokes a certain melancholy; like a half-remembered dream of mid-century consumerism. Adams’s work reminds me of Ed Ruscha’s gas station photographs, in that they both isolate the mundane and imbue it with meaning, and, like Ruscha, there's a deadpan humor in Adams's work, too. Art doesn't have to provide all the answers; sometimes, the question is the artwork.