James Nicholson Gallery is pleased to announce an exhibition of new large-scale color photographs by German artist Thomas Wrede. The exhibition will open on November 6, 2003 and continue through December 20, 2003. The opening reception will take place at the gallery on Thursday, November 6 from 5:30-7:30 pm. Thomas Wrede’s primary interest is the search for sanctuary within an environment overrun by manmade structures. Wrede’s visually spellbinding, multilayered photographs make visible a yearning for open space, a lost paradise. In some photographs Wrede uses subtle digital techniques to create a sense of unreality and even foreboding. While in others, he bends the film plane of an 8” x 10” view camera, coaxing impossible depths of field into a single image, transforming an ordinary landscape into an otherworldly scene. This show will present images from three recent series. “Small Worlds” are 48 x 94 inch photographs that depict dreamlike scenes of huge clouds, green fields, and ships upon the sea. These images are saturated with jewel-toned colors creating a surreal, illusory space. The series “In the Mud Flats” captures individuals wandering in stillness across a seemingly unending marsh plain or standing alone in shallow water that appears to continue forever. These photographs are nearly monotone, as if a frozen wonderland has been washed in a pale blue dye. The series “Landscapes” reveals how nature is shaped by massive structures such as highway overpasses and bridges. In these photographs Wrede captures moments of quiet contemplation amidst concrete and steel. Wrede teaches photography at the Academy of Art in Muenster, Germany, and has won numerous German photography awards. While Wrede has shown extensively in Europe and New York, this will be his first exhibition on the West Coast.