After the Threshold

In her third monograph, which includes an insightful essay by critic Vicki Goldberg, photographer Fifield (Between Planting and Picking) weaves an uplifting visual tapestry of her everyday life using the power of light and color. At first glimpse, the collection appears unified by her singular point of view and style, but little else. However, on closer inspection, each mysterious trio and quartet contains unifying thematic and geometric rhythms that make them complete. The photographer’s favorite subjects become evident early on, including: the natural world, windows and reflections, and an obscured or blurry artwork. These understated and economical arrangements (41 groups of photos altogether) resemble haikus. Fifield’s photographs evoke dreams that linger upon slowly waking in a foreign place, and some of the images appear to have been taken on her travels, as evidenced by her titles: Montauk Blue and Mare Ionio. Far from typical travel pictures, each combination of images functions as its own peculiar moody narrative with a certain logic of lines, shapes, and colors. Fifield remarkably draws us in using the simplest of details: a circular tattoo on a foot, a hand holding the corner of a map, or the pattern of tape on a window. Such ordinary moments might have been overlooked were it not for Fifield’s engaged, transforming eye. Photos. (Apr.)