Autobiographic Dramas
Color Grids (1988-1989)
20” x 24” Color Coupler Prints

In describing Grant’s studio practice through this thirty-year period and the works in the series, Autobiographic Dramas, Nancy Whitenack of Conduit Gallery wrote,

“Susan kae Grant's seminal color works (grids and rectangular pieces) from the 1980's are gripping and dramatic. Color is emphatic. The works have an intense, determined visceral punch, plunging the viewer into a look at a variety of themes in today's world: the role of women and sexual politics, among others. Confronting personal issues and articulating those feelings via Autobiographical Dramas, the artist developed a series of photographic narratives with ambiguous dilemmas, provoking questions, rather than answers. Sometimes she used models, and other times she photographed herself in the narratives, but always as a vehicle for examining universal ideas.” (Whitenack 2007, pp. 30-31)

The images in Autobiographic Dramas were made with a 4 x 5 view camera, a location generator, and a combination of tungsten min-spots and theater stage lights with color gels. The grids are constructed using a variety of 4 x 5 negatives and/or by cutting a single 4 x 5 negative into sections. The printing was done by hand in a Dev-Tec drum. Each separate print in the 5’ tall grids measure 20" x 24" and are either framed in maple or mounted on aluminum.

Acquisitions: Contact Conduit Gallery
Exhibitions: Contact Susan kae Grant