Lola Series 2 by Joshua Schwalbach-Scott

This image from the Lola series by contender, Joshua Schwalbach-Scott, is the type of stylized photographic eye-candy that might be more at home on a billboard or your TV screen than on the walls of a gallery. Upon seeing the images I became instantly nostalgic for the viral Sony Bravia ads featuring bouncy balls and paint cannons.

Outside the context of logos, headlines, and lifestyle-branding, the Lola series (actually outtakes from a commercial perfume shoot) evoke an abstract kind of whimsy. These images, Joshua writes, are:

. . . artistic interpretations out of items in our overly commercialized society, which is an overall theme throughout my work.

To me, this recontextualization of commercial photography is akin to the appropriation work of Richard Prince, whose infamous rephotographs of the unbranded elements of magazine ads created a bold new category of fine art.

Untitled (Cowboy), 1989, by Richard Prince

Lola Series 1 by Joshua Schwalbach-Scott

However, Joshua's work isn't limited to literal explosions of color. Other portfolios up on his site such as Snapshots and Hong Kong show his engagement with street and travel photography. The diverse subject matter allows us to see several sides of a single artist whose experimentation and crossover between personal and commercial work makes him an exciting photographer to watch.