Henry Horenstein
Born 1947, New Bedford, MA, lives and works in Boston, MA
Longnose Skate Raja rhina, from the “Aquatics” series, 1995-1999, platinum print, 20” x 16”, Courtesy Robert Klein Gallery
In his early career, Henry Horenstein documented horse racing, baseball, and honky-tonk culture in black and white straight photographs. Creatures, a body of work that involved photographing animals in zoos, inspired his Aquatics series, in which Horenstein photographed sea creatures behind the thick plate glass of aquariums around the world. Despite identifying himself as a “historian with a camera,” Horenstein reveals an interest in abstraction in Aquatics and a departure from his past documentary style work.
Shot in black and white film, this series emphasizes abstract composition over the presentation of specific information and underscores the implicit beauty and tenderness of the poetic forms created by animals. Horenstein uses a toning process often used for color film which gives the pictures a brown hue reminiscent of sepia toning from the nineteenth century that further romanticizes his subjects. For the photographer, his “best photos are both warm and unsettling.” These beautiful, organic animal forms, removed from their context, are more likely to be found swimming around in one’s head than behind the glass of an aquarium.
