Nina Welch-Kling is an expert at pairing photographs, producing diptychs that talk to each other through colour, shape and rhyme
Main image: ‘Richly complex’ … an image from one of Welch-Kling’s diptychs. Photograph: Nina Welch-Kling
Tue 5 Sep 2023 02.00 EDT Last modified on Wed 6 Sep 2023 18.21 EDT
For the project Duologues, Nina Welch-Kling paired two photographs to create diptychs, evoking a dialogue between them. All photographs: Nina Welch-Kling from the book Duologues, published by Kehrer VerlagShare on FacebookShare on Twitter
Welch-Kling has a particular talent for noticing aligned colours, patterns or narrative elements between images Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
The book includes both colour and black and white imagery. Thoughtful sequencing and substantive written contributions all combine to result in a richly complex collection that invites the viewer to linger, consider, discover Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
Seemingly random moments within the picture carry meaning by their juxtapositions of people and place Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
Her curated diptychs are rich in visual parallels and Welch-Kling writes about the ‘discovery process’ for viewers in interpreting the meanings: ‘Reminiscent of the idea of synchronicity, an idea that describes meaningful coincidences, my pairings intentionally produce uncanny relationships’ Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
Welch-Kling speaks of shooting intuitively, noticing distinguishing features in shapes, light, people or the surrounding environment Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
In describing her process for pairing her images, she referenced the game Memory, noting: ‘I match the images by playing a game of Memory: finding in each image shapes, gestures, and symbols that rhyme’ Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
The rhyming may occur within the major elements in the image, such as the subject or in minute details that otherwise might go unnoticed Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
By pairing two photos that occurred at different moments in time, the story that emerges can bring them together. The final sequence feels deeply connected, even though the encounters on the street were random Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
In his essay for the book, entitled More Than the Sum of its Parts, celebrated street photographer Jeff Mermelstein writes: ‘Picture magnetism pulls and holds particular images together; they lock together, like the word pieces of poems, on the surface, below the surface, and deep inside in that somewhere that is uniquely photographic. At times there is a kind of magnetic tug of war, for example with the photograph of the curved architectural wall paired with the picture of the back of a man. It is as if he is fighting the powerful pull of the wall with all the strength of Atlas’ Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
Mermelstein also writes: ‘I’ve always felt that music and photographs are related, and this body of work illustrates that idea; a certain frequency and pitch, an arrangement of pictures that lures us in, like visual sound that slowly but surely leaves a residue that has poetic staying power and a ringing in the mind’s eye’ Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
The book includes writing by fellow New York City photographer Gulnara Samoilova who focuses much of her own work on street photography and on elevating the visual voices of women street photographers. She reflects that: ‘The street, perhaps the most pedestrian, democratic, and accessible place on Earth, is a marvelous mix of the mystical and the mundane. Heeding its siren call, photographers flock to the street for the chance to transform the prosaic into poetry. Like all great modernists, Nina sees life as a configuration of light, colour, composition and form’ Share on FacebookShare on Twitter
