Nicola Loder : "Child 1-175: a nostalgia for the present" (1996)

Child 1-175: a nostalgia for the present

Nicola Loder

(1996)

175 Silver Gelatin Prints

(image from Nicola Loder)

“Loder’s subjects undermined the myth that childhood comprises the “best years of our life’” (Hold, 1996). Said powerfully, Loder’s work in Child 1-175 gives us a taste of the child that breaches that myth; the child who is strong, powerful, experienced, and knowing. The tight portraits of these children integrated within the grid-like frame repeatedly challenge the viewer’s ideal of children. "The sheer repetition of the images in the installation gives the children as a unit menacing power" (Marsh, 2000). The images let us peer into the door of the adult perception of childhood, while proving to us that children cannot be predicted and thought of as a whole, though they are united in that respect. “Her strong character portraits suggest levels of knowledge, torment, ritual, self-possession, humor, and pathos that often go unacknowledged by adults” (Hold, 1996). The images, which are shot from below, put the child’s body (head) in a position above the viewers, showing Loder’s respect for the children; “close investigation reveals the artist’s respect for her subjects, who are shot mostly from below in thoughtful or rapt poses… lost in thought or emotion, inaccessible to us or challenging us” (Freiberg, 1996). These countless representations of children challenge the slighted view of children as universal and naïve that we see often today. "By grouping 175 such images together, she [Loder] created a metaphor for the elaborate and restrictive social structure of childhood, within each individual must find a place" (Hold, 1996).

Artist Biography: Available at Nicola Loder

Exhibitions: Telling Tales: The Child in Contemporary Photography.

 Rapport: 8 artists from Singapore and Australia.

References: Hold, H. (1996). Nicola Loder. Issue #4 (p96). Retrieved from.
Freiberg, F. (1996). Photo Opportunities is St Kilda. Visual arts. Retrieved from.
Marsh, A. (2000). Telling Tales: The child in Contemporary Photography. Retrieved from.