REVIEW: JOEL-PETER WITKIN, THE EARLY WORKS

In an arresting black-and-white photograph, two figures in profile stand face-to-face before a dark screen, which is partially surrounded by a pale border. Their heads are tightly bound together, completely obscured by what appears to be white gauze—calling to mind the linen strips ancient Egyptians used to wrap their dead nobles—while their bodies are strapped to one another with what may be a pair of black leather belts. The towering model on the left appears to have no arms, yet the much smaller one on the right clearly does, and they’re folded around the other’s waist. Whether their intertwining is being enacted of their own volition, as in a consensual BDSM framework, or represents something much more sinister—a scene of subjugation and violence evocative of, say, the torture programs at Abu Ghraib—is ambiguous. The surface of the print bears a number of calculated scratches, accentuating that, overall, the image is a product of dextrous darkroom manipulation.