Ren Hang – Untitled (2013)

It’s a depressing truth: Acetylene Eyes includes far, far too few of Hang’s images. In fact, I’ve only posted one previously–it’s worth revisiting as it’s a damn fine picture but also because I absolutely stand by my commentary.

The confrontational constancy of the work is less off-putting to me now. Yes, it’s trangressive as a hot goddamn. I’ve come to not only admire Hang’s Negative Fucks Given™ tact but to find humor in it.

The humor comes when you realize that he actively lampoons Internet famous photographers. His use of strobe is all Terry Richardson. The work in his second 2014 gallery takes brutal pot shots at the obvious disparity (and disingenuousness) between the public explanations and private intentions of folks like Noah Kalina and Ryan McGinley.

And what I’m realizing is his work also integrates color into not only composition but the image as a whole in ways that very few people since Eggleston have managed.