{"id":122226,"date":"2018-03-07T13:00:55","date_gmt":"2018-03-07T18:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=122226"},"modified":"2018-03-13T12:41:56","modified_gmt":"2018-03-13T16:41:56","slug":"on-tania-franco-kleins-our-life-in-the-shadows","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/03\/07\/on-tania-franco-kleins-our-life-in-the-shadows\/","title":{"rendered":"On Tania Franco Klein\u2019s \u201cOur Life in the Shadows\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-20.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-122241\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-20.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"668\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-20.jpg 1000w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-20-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-20-768x513.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 62.5em) 67vw, 100vw\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In Tania Franco Klein<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s photo series \u201cOur Life in the Shadows<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201d\u2014<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">on display last month at Mexico City<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s Material art fair and San Francisco<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s Photofairs<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2014<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">women stare blankly at static television screens, mirrored toaster ovens, and hazily lit window curtains. A sense of ennui permeates the images, which depict domestic life in rich cinematic detail. Each subject is cropped so that her face is never fully in view. Often, the women are distorted by a reflection or an obfuscating prop. In <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Waiting,<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> one of the fifty images that comprise the series, a bowl of lipstick-marked cigarettes is perched ceremoniously atop a pillow. The living room is saturated with a moody cobalt blue. (Other images are steeped in jewel-toned reds and deep emerald greens.) Unpeopled and static, the photo is, conceivably, a portrait; the alluring mise-en-sc\u00e8ne bears only traces of the person out of view.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">My main character is emotions,<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201d <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">says the twenty-seven-year-old Mexico City\u2013based photographer, who treats houses, furniture, and human subjects as vessels for those emotions<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2014<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">which range from anxiety and melancholy to existential stress. On February 23, at San Francisco<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s Photofairs<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, three self-portraits from the series were on view. In the photographs, Franco Klein is topless, gazing out at a mattress-littered desert road; lying on a carpeted floor, facing her muddled reflection; and in a kitchen, keeled over in exhaustion.<\/span><b>\u00a0<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Anxious and rudderless, her characters are ill at ease in their environments. Though Franco Klein envisions each subject, including herself, in what she calls a <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">private jungle<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201d\u2014<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">bathroom, sofa, train seat<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2014<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">there is invariably a voyeuristic element at play. By looking or even physically turning away from the camera, Franco Klein<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s subjects are almost<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2014<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">but never completely<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2014<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">able to evade our gaze.\u00a0<\/span><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-2.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-122262\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-2.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"6016\" height=\"4016\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-2.jpg 6016w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-2-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-2-768x513.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-2-1024x684.jpg 1024w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 62.5em) 67vw, 100vw\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Throughout the series, balding velvet settees and rickety wooden chairs are treated at once like precious objects and ugly, forgotten debris<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2014<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">clever metaphors for how women themselves are paradoxically valued and devalued in domestic spaces as maids, sex workers, housewives, and mothers. Anachronistic details like a princess phone, a clunky television set, and a gas stove from the sixties<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0appear in disorienting scenes that sidestep any one specific era. In their simple costumes and cherry-red lipstick, Franco Klein<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s characters evoke a timeless femininity.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If a nuclear family, kempt house, and diligent housewife comprise the American Dream (at least by<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0the standards of the fifties), then Franco Klein<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s destruction of nostalgia-inducing furniture signals a refusal to conform to such expectations. Viewed in tandem with photos of discarded mattresses, the image of a couch on fire is stark and conclusive. Mattresses and couches absorb, quite grotesquely, years of their owners<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019 <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">sweat and dead skin cells,\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">evidencing the passage of time and, with it, our bodies<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019 <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">gradual, inevitable decay. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Franco Klein<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s obliteration of the couch signals the willful, cathartic end to a painful chapter in her life as much as it does a refusal to cede to gender-specific social pressures. In 2016, after finishing a graduate program at the University of the Arts London, Franco Klein was nomadic, living in new cities every two months. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I lost my sense of home,<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201d <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">she says. Franco Klein became interested in the Polish psychologist Kazimierz D\u0105browski<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Positive-Disintegration-Ph-D-Kazimierz-Dabrowski\/dp\/1600250955\/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_img_1?_encoding=UTF8&amp;psc=1&amp;refRID=097KDFTSBY0R4A2NSRE0\" target=\"_blank\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">theory of positive disintegration<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> (TPD), which posits that we are at our greatest potential for growth after periods of anxiety, depression, or trauma. (In 2017, at Mexico City<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s Zona Maco fair, she named her photo installation <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Positive Disintegration.<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201d<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">) Franco Klein was also influenced by Byung-Chul Han<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s book <\/span><a href=\"http:\/\/www.sup.org\/books\/title\/?id=25725\" target=\"_blank\"><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Burnout Society<\/span><\/i><\/a><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, <\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">in which he argues that a fixation on self-improvement is endemic to our postindustrial, digital age and that it leads to an accumulation of stress and exhaustion.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-3.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-122260\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-3.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"668\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-3.jpg 1000w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-3-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-3-768x513.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 62.5em) 67vw, 100vw\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Throughout this series, Franco Klein wears a voluminous, curly wig and retro square-framed glasses, disguising herself, alternately, as a lost heroine, a disgruntled suburbanite, and a troubled party guest. Her characters make languorous gestures and are perpetually on the brink of collapse; their eyes are often concentrated but empty, evidence that they are only half present to the world around them. In a sterile green-lit bathroom<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2014<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">a crime scene, possibly<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2014Franco\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Klein twists on the floor in pleasure or pain or both, wearing high-waisted nude tights that accentuate her strained muscles. In a diptych, she becomes another character, sandwiched between couch cushions, her body fragmented and trapped by the furniture<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s overbearing weight. Her head, hair, and left shoulder are the only parts in view in one frame; only her torso, derrie<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">re, and calves are visible in another. These perverse positions exacerbate the mental and emotional gymnastics each character undergoes to reckon with her respective reality. Instead of providing comfort or support, the furniture constricts and even smothers Franco Klein.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Franco Klein finds freedom in her characters<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019 <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">anonymity and deploys a dreamy color palette to illuminate gradations of depression. Velvety oranges and reds fill one bedroom with a warmth that is at odds with her subject<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s blank expression. When she attempts to reconcile a tumultuous inner life with her external environment, it results in the ultimate escape fantasy: to disappear, to live only on screen. On a black-and-white television screen, there is a small, almost spectral figure in view. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The television shows the same scene as the photo,<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201d Franco\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Klein explains. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In a way, the character disappears from her own reality and is lost in the image of herself.<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-4.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-122259\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-4.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"668\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-4.jpg 1000w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-4-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-4-768x513.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 62.5em) 67vw, 100vw\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Though most of these images are self-portraits, she does occasionally scout subjects<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2014<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">in her grandmother<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s apartment building, in seniors<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019 <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">water-aerobics classes, and on the street. To set up a scene in which an infant lies in a car, Franco Klein scoured cars parked in her neighborhood. After finding a car with the exact color and textured interior that she wanted<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2014\u201d<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">the usual velvet I have in my photos<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201d\u2014Franco\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Klein left a note for the owner, asking to use his car for her shoot on the following day. He obliged, they scheduled a shoot time, and she borrowed a friend<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s baby for the photo. The resulting image is unnerving: a lone diapered baby bathed in a supernatural pinkish light lies faceup\u00a0in the backseat of a car, unattended. There are no seat belts, car seats, or adults in view, which renders this otherwise ordinary scene exceedingly strange. We are left to wonder: Is the baby crying? Where are its parents? Will it survive? <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When we see an abandoned baby, it<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s so vulnerable that we quickly want to protect it,<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201d Franco\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Klein explains. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But we don<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">t have the same feelings of empathy for someone our own age, when they might need us just as much.<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201d <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As adults, our physical and emotional needs evolve and deepen; the image conveys that, regardless of age, we are all vulnerable and, in solipsistic terms, ultimately alone. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What permeates all the work is isolation,<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201d Franco\u00a0<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Klein says. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A lot of people feel lonely. That<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s a huge issue. We<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">re satisfying our egos but are feeling more lonely than ever.<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For this series, Franco Klein took most of the interior shots in Mexico City, her hometown, and saved exterior shots for trips to Long Beach, California, and small towns around Palm Springs. Because of ongoing violence in Mexico City\u2014kidnappings, assaults, gun violence\u2014Franco Klein is vigilant about her safety when working at home. \u201cIn California, I feel so free to take these photos,\u201d she says. \u201cI don\u2019t have the same paranoia.\u201d In <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Our Life in the Shadows,<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201d<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u00a0Franco Klein retreats to homelike spaces, perhaps looking for an oasis of comfort and security. Instead, she finds unstable, even volatile environments that are immersive, corrosive, and charged with psychic stress. In delving deep into such fraught emotional states, Franco Klein taps into her own ability to transcend the circumstances to which she<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u2019<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">s bound.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-25.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-122263\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-25.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"668\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-25.jpg 1000w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-25-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/03\/libro-grandes-dos-25-768x513.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 62.5em) 67vw, 100vw\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><em>All photos courtesy of Tania Franco Klein.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><em><a href=\"http:\/\/annafurman.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" data-saferedirecturl=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/url?hl=en&amp;q=http:\/\/annafurman.com&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1520357326176000&amp;usg=AFQjCNELYz5LcuDYwIMW8t-zrc05VOi1cA\">Anna Furman<\/a>\u00a0is a writer based in San Francisco. Her work has appeared in <\/em>New York<em> magazine, the <\/em>Guardian<em>, <\/em>Guernica<em>, and elsewhere.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; In Tania Franco Klein\u2019s photo series \u201cOur Life in the Shadows\u201d\u2014on display last month at Mexico City\u2019s Material art fair and San Francisco\u2019s Photofairs\u2014women stare blankly at static television screens, mirrored toaster ovens, and hazily lit window curtains. A sense of ennui permeates the images, which depict domestic life in rich cinematic detail. Each [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1415,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[419],"tags":[20331,2229,100,15618,93,33194],"class_list":["post-122226","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arts-culture","tag-american-dream","tag-mexico-city","tag-photography","tag-portraiture","tag-san-francisco","tag-tania-franco-klein"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.4 (Yoast SEO v25.4) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>On Tania Franco Klein\u2019s \u201cOur Life in the Shadows\u201d<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Mexican photographer captures the domestic spaces she calls a \u201cprivate jungle,\u201d yet there is invariably a voyeuristic element at play.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2018\/03\/07\/on-tania-franco-kleins-our-life-in-the-shadows\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"On Tania Franco Klein\u2019s \u201cOur Life in the Shadows\u201d by Anna Furman\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"March 7, 2018 \u2013 &nbsp; 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