Alex Yudzon

“My first memory of being in a hotel is also my first memory of being in this country.” Born in Russia, Alex Yudzon lives and works in the United States. His art practice, mainly photography yet broadly inspired by the history of painting, speaks to the alienation associated with the American dream and the inevitable disappointments that await immigrants. His sober atmospheres, at times sinister, at times closer to the field of advertising, suit the absurd configurations in which different elements from his dual culture are put in tension, creating a discrepancy between the familiar and the “elsewhere,” even the exotic. Fascinated by the instability inherent in notions of identity, displacement, and collective memory, Yudzon heightens the anxious feeling that comes from such unease in his small theatres. This powerful theme is addressed head on in A Room for the Night (2014–ongoing), a series of photographs taken in hotel rooms around the world. Bearing a curious resemblance to one another, the photographs show assemblages of furniture and objects found onsite and stacked up by Yudzon in the middle of these anonymous rooms like sculptures that are both compelling and disturbing. Straddling film noir, archival photography, and still life, the series explores the slippages that develop between the familiar and the generic, intensifying the resulting unease. Yudzon is particularly interested in the kitsch aspect of these somewhat mundane and temporary places in which thousands of strangers stay and in the vernacular aesthetic of rooms that, out of an avowed desire to create a sense of familiarity and a resolve to make us feel “at home,” use the same trivial pictures, the same saccharine colour palette, the same tedious decor. The installations come across somewhat like memento mori, reminding us that even on Earth, we are just tourists. The photographs become the evidence of Yudzon’s presence, as he puts everything back in its place once he’s taken them. No one will ever know. The hotel becomes a liminal place of the chaotic transit of memories and lives, all quickly forgotten. Translated from the French by Oana Avasilichioaei Holding a master’s degree in art history with a concentration in feminist studies, Anne-Marie Dubois uses the critical potential of feminist and queer theories to debunk different discourses’ ontological claim to truth. Alex YudzonThe Mayo Hotel, 2021, from the series A Room for the Night, Tulsa,2014–ongoing.Photo: courtesy of the artist Alex YudzonCongress Plaza Hotel no. 1, 2021, from the series A Room for the Night, Chicago, 2014–ongoing.Photo: courtesy of the artist Alex Yudzon, Anne-Marie Dubois Alex Yudzon, Anne-Marie Dubois Alex Yudzon, Anne-Marie Dubois Alex Yudzon, Anne-Marie Dubois Alex Yudzon, Anne-Marie Dubois Alex Yudzon, Anne-Marie Dubois Alex Yudzon, Anne-Marie Dubois Alex Yudzon, Anne-Marie DuboisAlex Yudzon, Anne-Marie DuboisAlex Yudzon, Anne-Marie DuboisAlex Yudzon, Anne-Marie Dubois

Alex Yudzon

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