Audio By Carbonatix
Bill Owens: Leisure So thats the way we all became the Brady Bunch. Bill Owens black-and-white and color shots illustrate what makes American life so distinctively indistinct: the leisurely whiles of suburbanites on vacation and everyday events of not-so-edgy life on the urban edge. Beneath a photo of two women at a flea market, one showing wigs to the other, a caption reads I dont know why I bought another wig. What I really needed was some deck furniture. Such are the quippy forget-me-nots of a land of overabundance for the high-grounded and lucky. This collection of pictures past, taken in the 60s, 70s and early 80s, seems touched by romanticism. Its not so much that they reek of wistful longing, but rather that they offer only the distillation of a landscapes past, the yesterday of suburbia as seen in Fourth of July parades, a goggle-eyed mother slurping soda pop in front of Mickey Ds and a fur-clad woman in her Porsche-filled garage. Its not as though any of this has changed that much. Sprawl has sprawled further. What about the continuation of this life today? Where are the photos of 21st-century Schaumburg outside of Chicago, or how about our own Frisco? Their strength lies in their combined mad-scientist and routinized feel. These images read like an anthropological study. Their deadpan flatness renders human subjectsa smiling husband and wife feeding a chubby baby while tall circuit breakers loom through the kitchen window, brothers in camouflage hats toting toy guns, ladies with wigs in handsas so many dehumanized species in a terrarium. Through October 29 at Photographs Do Not Bend Gallery, 3115 Routh St., 214-969-1852. (Charissa N. Terranova)