{"data":{"id":"5240","type":"artist","attributes":{"id":5240,"topgoose_id":254,"tms_id":5240,"display_name":"Christopher Williams","sort_name":"Williams Christopher","display_date":"1956–","begin_date":"1956","end_date":"0","biography":"\u003cp\u003eRooted within the technical precision\nwith which Christopher Williams constructs\nhis photographs is a conceptual practice\nthat investigates the medium of color\nphotography itself and the role that it plays\nin creating social and cultural meaning.\n\u003ca href=\"/collection/works/27531\"\u003e\u003cem\u003eKodak Three Point Reflection Guide ©\n1968 Eastman Kodak Company, 1968 (Meiko\nlaughing)\u003c/em\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003cem\u003e, Vancouver, B.C., April 6, 2005\u003c/em\u003e\nis part of a series that belongs to a vast\nphotographic project titled \u003cem\u003eDie Welt ist\nschön\u003c/em\u003e (The world is beautiful) that Williams\nembarked upon in the late 1980s and that\nincluded several other series also devoted\nto specific brands of film, such as Kodak,\nFuji, and AGFA. Although not a stock\ncommercial photograph, this image has\nbeen carefully staged to appear like one:\nthe cheerful model is set against a plain\nstudio backdrop and her gaze seems fixed\non the middle distance, while the image\nincludes an Eastman Kodak color bar, used\nto help publishers achieve the correct\nhues in print. The work is made using\nKodak film, processing chemicals, and\nphotographic paper, but Williams references\nthe company visually, too: the yellow color\nof the towels wrapped around Meiko’s\nhead and body is calibrated exactly to match\nthe dominant hue of Kodak’s packaging, a\nshade that Williams has suggested connotes\n“warmth, sunshine, spring, domestic bliss.”\nColor photography is thus linked intimately\nwith the artifice of advertising and consumer\nculture that shaped the world in 2005 just\nas it did in 1968, allowing for the precise\nconstruction of beauty and the manipulation\nof emotions as well as images.\u003c/p\u003e","on_view":false,"artport":false,"biennial":true,"collection":true,"ulan_id":"500029979","wikidata_id":"Q1087061","created_at":"2017-08-30T15:34:54.000-04:00","updated_at":"2026-04-09T07:02:34.310-04:00","links":{"artworks":"/api/artists/5240/artworks","exhibitions":"/api/artists/5240/exhibitions"}}}}