Rain: The Ice Cream Parlor
Artist
Erwin Olaf
Dutch, 1959–2023
Date2004
MediumChromogenic print on paper mounted to Plexiglas
Dimensions30 x 30 in. (76.2 x 76.2 cm)
ClassificationsPhotography
Credit LineGift of Allen G. Thomas Jr. in memory of Mary Louise Barnes Smith
Object number2010.7
On View
Not on viewStrangely unsettling, Erwin Olaf’s Rain photographs are brightly colored and exquisitely arranged tableaus nearly mirroring Norman Rockwell’s paintings of 1950s Americana. Individuals, such as a boy scout, cheerleaders, secretaries, and businessmen, stand eerily still in pristine locations, emotionlessly waiting for someone or something. The scout in Rain: The Ice Cream Parlor seems almost inhuman, frozen in an icy blue-gray environment that is too sterile and cold, creating an undercurrent of morose foreboding.
Responding to the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Olaf originally intended to create a series celebrating American culture and traditional imagery, but as he began photographing, his feelings changed to a strong sadness “about this time, about our time,” he says. When he made Rain, he “really felt very down. You can see it in the coloring and the casting. They’re hopeless.” Olaf likens the arrangement of each photograph in this series to the moment preceding a breakup. The works are emotionally charged and anti-Rockwellian in their isolating depths.ProvenanceCreated 2004; collection of the artist; [Hasted Hunt Gallery, New York]; Allen G. Thomas Jr., Wilson, NC, 2006; given to NCMA, 2010.
Published ReferencesErwin Olaf, Rain/Hope (Utrecht: Flatland Galleries, 1996), illus. (color) 2.Exhibition HistoryNew York, NY, Hasted Hunt Gallery, "Erwin Olaf: Rain," January 5-February 18, 2006.
Winston-Salem, NC, Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art, "Erwin Olaf: Still Living," September 12, 2008-January 4, 2009.
Raleigh, NC, North Carolina Museum of Art, “The Energy of Youth: Depicting Childhood in the NCMA’s Photography Collection,” September 26, 2015–April 3, 2016.
Raleigh, NC, North Carolina Museum of Art, "Photographs from the Collection of Allen G. Thomas Jr.," August 20, 2022-February 12, 2023. Object Rights Statement
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