Jordan Kantor

Lens Flare

Lens Flare was part of a solo project by the artist presented at ArtBasel in 2009. Included in the Kadist Collection, these works continue to explore the ontology of the image to investigate the relationship between painting, photography, and a new time-based variable: film. Reduced here to the essential function of recording the exposure of light through the apparatus of a lens, Jordan Kantor then translated these film stills into painted colored canvases that retain the 3:4 aspect ratio of the 16mm film as well as the exact size of the projected image. The resulting paintings depict the “lens flares” in the film—the fleeting reflective glare inside the camera apparatus that results from when its lens is pointed directly at a bright light source.