Through my friend Sarah Elizabeth’s book The Art of Darkness, I was introduced to the work of Aron Wiesenfeld. There’s a Post-It Note on the page featuring Wiesenfeld’s oil on panel piece The Pit with a scribble of text saying, ‘do a photo series inspired by this.’ I set out to do so the other day, though it didn’t go to plan, namely because I couldn’t find a pit to gaze mournfully into.
“The moody spaces of American artist Aron Wiesenfeld thrum quietly with moments of melancholy and a deep sense of loneliness. His scenes are of dimly lit liminality: sparse, shadowy landscapes outside of borders where the wilderness and urban converge and paths or portals often appear. We don’t know whether the characters in them will take that road or make the leap beyond; they exist perpetually at the threshold of their own personal fable in the solitude of self-reflection as they stare off into an enigmatic abyss.”
Sarah Elizabeth
I don’t love all of Wiesenfeld’s work. Much doesn’t resonate with me for one reason or another. (Though that’s not to say I don’t have a colossal amount of respect for his artistry.) Still, there are several pieces, such as The Pit and the others below, which I’m entranced and (obviously) highly inspired by.
Celebrating the strange and the shadowy, the damned and unseen 