Niko Luoma: For Each Minute, Sixty-Five Seconds

Multilayered color photographs reimagining famous artworks from Van Gogh to Bacon, by Helsinki School photographer Niko Luoma

Using up to 1,000 multiple exposures, Finnish photographer Niko Luoma (born 1970) applies individual elements of color and form to the negative, layer by layer. Meticulous calculations and geometrical skills are the necessary foundation for this; the results are abstract photographs of exceptional chromatic intensity and luminosity.

For Each Minute, Sixty-Five Seconds is based on the series Adaptions, which reproduces famous works by other artists. Luoma--well known for his previous Hatje Cantz collection, And Time Is No Longer an Obstacle (2012)--offers a fascinating visual interplay between the compositional qualities of the photograph and its reverence toward Bacon, Hockney, Van Gogh and Picasso. With tongue in cheek, Luoma thus humorously realizes the avant-gardes aspiration to liberate photography from the obligation to faithfully reproduce reality, allowing it to become an art.