In the second half of photographer Guy Tillim’s Second Nature project he continues the exploration into landscapes he began on the Polynesian islands last year.
This time Tillim turns his lens to the sprawling megalopolis of São Paulo in Brazil. With more than 20-million inhabitants, it’s hard to imagine a space more different from the untouched natural environment he captured in his landscape images of Polynesia. But Tillim refuses such easy divisions between natural and human-dominated ecosystems. In his photographs a person walking is no more important than a signpost, a tree or a building. This complex combination of objects, spaces, people and practices highlights the organic social networks of urban innovation that provide for and reproduce life in cities in the South. The result is a provocative reimagining of urban space that invites us to rethink our conception of “landscape”.
Stevenson Gallery, Buchanan Building, 160 Sir Lowry Road, Woodstock, until March 30. Tel: 021 462 1500. Website: stevenson.info.