Nicole Reed: Scenes from the People's Paradise - Pyongyang. Curated and presented by aMBUSH Gallery. Until December 1.
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This exhibition comprises 33 aluminium prints of images by Nicole Reed, a Melbourne-based photographer who says that, for her, photography is more than just a career - it's a way of life.
Reed has exhibited in solo shows across Australia and internationally. She contributed to the Outpost Project on Cockatoo Island, Sydney and created commissioned works for White Night Melbourne, where her photography was projected onto the walls of the National Gallery of Victoria.
Among other achievements, she held a solo exhibition at The Patterson Gallery as part of the Independent Photography Festival, and had a work acquired by the National Gallery of Victoria.
So I was keen to see this work.
In this exhibition Reed has captured the urban environment of Pyongyang, the capital of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), where few tourists visit.
My immediate response to the images was that Pyongyang reminded me very much of what I saw on a visit to Beijing earlier this year.
Closer inspection soon identified one major difference - the few people on the streets of Pyongyang compared with the much larger numbers in Beijing.
And, on her website, Reed writes, "Pyongyang is certainly beautiful on the surface; but it's also a place that is virtually impossible to capture with truth, which I have come to terms with, as you can only photograph what you see, well, some of the time - if you are allowed."
Reed was in the DPRK for just five days for a commercial shoot, capturing the unique architecture of the city's hotels for a photobook.
She shot the images for this exhibition during her limited spare time. They are mainly architectural and have few people in them, because during the day most people are at work and there are few tourists.
That is very much part of their attraction. In numerous places we visit as tourists there are now so many other people present that I hear complaints about how hard it is to photograph the sights.
She sought out examples of the city's imposing buildings, grand public monuments and different streetscapes. She was limited in where she could go, could see and was permitted to photograph.
Nevertheless, Reed captured numbers of imposing sporting stadiums built in styles to reflect particular sports - including weightlifting, table tennis and badminton.
She photographed apartments, hotels, a planetarium, and a museum. She captured idiosyncratic sights as well. They are all here in the exhibition, providing glimpses of a city most of us have not seen.
The colour palette of the images is almost entirely pastels; the gallery coordinator told me during my visit that she had felt calm and serene all the time amid this exhibition.
Reed herself has described the sun as "quite soft, which created really beautiful tones for the sky and the buildings."
My favourites included Kim Song II Mural - depicting leaders of the DPRK, and Combat Stadium.
The standouts, though, are Metro Conductor - a fine image of a conductor before a mural; and Trolleybus Stop 1 - an equally interesting shot showing only the lower parts of waiting passengers. In the latter it is not easy to work out which parts of the background are real and which are painted.
Every element of every image reveals something of this mysterious city.
Every element of every image reveals something of this mysterious city
Reed aimed to evoke a sense of place and mood from one of the most difficult to understand countries. She has succeeded admirably. With powerful images of the grand and unique architecture, the streetscapes and the people, this exhibition evokes a strong sense of place and atmosphere from one of the most enigmatic of places.
The exhibition is well worth visiting.