Eyes examined

The cityscape is the subject of several of Eline Mugaas’s photo series, whether exterior or interior pictures, or close-up or wide-angle shots. Fully aware that a person’s gaze, whether it belongs to the photographer or the spectator, is based on subjective and collective experiences, Mugaas aims her lens at our urban surroundings. Her works include elements of documentary photography, but make no claim to being objective depictions of reality. With their formal composition and their due regard for weather and lighting, at all times of the day, Mugaas’s photographs lie somewhere between snapshots and staged events. As is the case with her colleague Marte Aas, the contemplation of time and space is a key element in several of Mugaas’ urban photographs.

In Eyes Examined, an abandoned optician’s store is the focus of a staging. Though it is no longer possible for us to have our eyes checked here by an optician, the artist uses camera optics to explore what our eyes are able to perceive in a wide sense. In addition to documenting this abandoned, empty store, Mugaas has also captured her own gaze as well as the viewer’s. She asks what we actually see in this closed shop in a scruffy neighbourhood, in a part of the city that rarely finds its way into a photo album or a newspaper report, but is passed by as we walk from one place to another.

Mugaas trained as an artist in the United States and works in both photo and video.