About Paula Rae Gibson

Gibson typically used black and white paper, torn from a long roll, to create uneven shapes in contrast with the pristine rectangular and square formats of conventional photographic prints. The interventions that each of Gibson’s photographs has undergone imbues them with an improvisational quality. Her prints have tangible patina to their surface. They are like the wounds of time and experience that can be read on the human body. The effect is unbounded and contingent. She wanted, she says, ‘to make pictures that are not visible in the viewfinder’. Hers are not the composed, standardized, precision results of an optical and chemical technology. They are more like a breathing product of human nature. It is an unconventional, experimental approach fit for attempting to harness immeasurable feelings.
Martin Barnes, senior curator, V and A museum .

Paula Rae Gibson's Books