Grounded in a strong tradition of feminist photographers’ images of themselves, Talia Chetrit’s compact show provokes fantasies of a woman/camera hybrid or of a piecemeal narrative in which the camera is intimately involved in the artist’s sexual experiences. At the least, the photos make it clear that Chetrit is in control of her body and the images of it—sometimes by literally showing the controls in her hand. Works like Plastic and Studio Sex, which have a sensuous mise–en–scène involving reflections captured in mirrors, recall Francesca Woodman’s haunting vignettes. By contrast, several composed waist-down shots are as frank and forthright as Carolee Schneemann’s documentation of her iconic performance Interior Scroll (1975). While Chetrit tends not to meet the viewer’s gaze as Hannah Wilke often does, there’s a matter-of-fact enjoyment that is like Wilke’s. The works in the exhibition convey a sense of female agency that plays with both art history and the erotic. —Cathy Lebowitz
Pictured: Talia Chetrit: Legs, 2016, silver gelatin print, 24 by 16 inches. Courtesy Kaufmann Repetto, New York and Milan. Photo Dawn Blackman.