Jason Thrasher | Uncovered Perspectives: India 21 Years Later

October 24, 2019
Updates

October 10-October 27, 2019
Curated by Lauren Fancher

Exhibition and Events at ATHICA

  • Reception: Sunday, October 13, 2019, 5:00-8:00 PM
  • Experimental Music Coordinated by Kathryn Koopman, Featuring Members of Thunder O(h)m!: Saturday, October 19, 2019, 7:00 PM
  • Music by Vimadean Duo, Featuring Denis Petrunin on Marimba and Anastasia Petrunina on Violin: Tuesday, October 22, 2019, 6:00 PM
  • Jason Thrasher Artist Talk and Closing Event, in Celebration of Diwali, the Indian Festival of Lights: Sunday, October 27, 2019, 4:00 PM

In 1998, Jason Thrasher crowd-sourced his months-long trip to India by pre-selling darkroom prints of the photographs he would take there; on his return, these photographs were exhibited, becoming an enduring body of work. This pre-digital, pre-Kickstarter era coincided with the arrival of the Internet in India and the dawn of the massive changes across the country that would occur over the next two decades.

Twenty years later, Thrasher pulled the negatives out and discovered things that had been edited out of memory or were made more fully-realizable through new digital techniques. He has now digitally scanned the negatives, re-worked them with digital software, and printed an expanded collection of images that tells the story anew in this upcoming exhibition at ATHICA.

Curator Lauren Fancher states that “These images of Jason Thrasher’s not only capture a unique moment in India on the brink of technological change but also in photography itself. This exhibition is an opportunity to share in Thrasher’s revisitation of his experience and his images. Our eyes have become accustomed to the infinite sharing of images through the Internet and to making a constant shallow pass over pictures from across the world. This is a deep look into a type of photographic journey that can’t be replicated today.”

Artist Jason Thrasher describes his decision to revisit this work: “Last year, on the 20th anniversary of my travels in India, I started reflecting on what India has meant to me over time, and on how much my life has changed since then. Once you have a wife, kids and a business, opportunities to take a four-month photographic journey don’t really occur. But that’s also the beauty of a significant trip like this—looking back is truly satisfying. On August 15th, 2018, I decided to post an image on social media every day from my trip to India along with a story about that image. On the third day, I discovered negatives I’d never printed and images I’d overlooked when I couldn’t pull a good print in my darkroom back in the nineties. I started scanning the negatives and working on them in Lightroom. My digital skills have improved a lot since I made the changeover from film, and I was surprised at how I was able to manipulate the levels on some of these previously “lost” images—pictures that are becoming new favorites.”

Jason Thrasher | Uncovered Perspectives: India 21 Years Later is sponsored in part by The James E. and Betty J. Huffer Foundation, The Georgia Council for the Arts, and The National Endowment for the Arts.

About the Artist Jason Thrasher
Jason Thrasher lives in Athens, Georgia, where he’s been working as an artist and professional photographer for 25 years. His coverage of the Southeast’s rich and varied music scene includes published portraits of the Drive-By Truckers, R.E.M. and the Elephant Six collective. His book Athens Potluck, about the Athens Music Scene was published in 2017, for which he won the Georgia Writers Association award for Georgia Author of the Year in 2018.

Thrasher’s photography has been published in Rolling Stone, Billboard, New York Magazine, New York Times, The Bitter Southerner, Entertainment Weekly, Paste, The AV Club, Salon, Pitchfork, Garden & Gun, USA Today and SPIN.

His fine art photography has been exhibited at the Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport in

Atlanta, ICA in London, Yerba Buena Arts Center in San Francisco, Ogden Museum of Southern Art in New Orleans, Corcoran School of Fine Art in Washington, DC, and the Atlanta Contemporary Arts Center.

Press Release:  ATHICA_PressRelease_Thrasher_October2019

Exhibition Catalog: Download Digital Catalog (33 MB)

Press: “Uncovered Perspectives: Jason Thrasher Revisits India Through Photography”, Art Notes, Jessica Smith, Flagpole Magazine, October 9, 2019.