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Reviews
A Cloud Study, Sunset "Sandra Gottlieb takes us to the outer edges of the sky above, where a mammoth mix of elements builds into great and magnificent masses. These monumental cloud formations possess surprising color and weight, much different than what we might expect at sunset, making the once familiar forms far more tactile and intense. Gottlieb takes these fantastical photographs from a unique perspective, a parallel view that has just the right mix of dizzying detail and frightening proximity. In some works, like A Cloud Study, Sunset No.11, we see the clouds appearing mountain-like against a cold, near nighttime sky. In A Cloud Study, Sunset No.4 and No.2 we find a dark dense border creeping in at the bottom like a harbinger of doom and destruction. In all, we see in these clouds formations a fact of nature that is all-powerful and ever present. It reminds us that our planet is one great system of interlocking elements that easily eclipses our own ability to create – and that we must not forget that nature is both an endless gift and a global responsibility." - D. Dominick Lombardi, Curator, 2017 A Cloud Study, Sunset "Sandra Gottlieb’s photographs focus literally on clouds. Roiling, billowing, dramatic masses consume the picture plane from latitude to longitude, border to border, like exhalations of the gods in high contrast. We are free to interpret these pictures, bringing along our own histories and imaginations or appreciate these magnificent manifestations of nature from any intellectual or sensory standpoint whatsoever. We may concentrate on the artist’s compositions, think scientifically or ecologically – we can seek out visions reflecting the Jungian notion of the collective subconscious." - Christopher Hart Chambers, dArt International, Fall 2017 "Gottlieb captures curious moments in the crests of waves — moments that can only be frozen and fully appreciated with high-speed still photography. Her image gives us time to think, to imagine what happens just before or right after the crest she has captured came to be. This sensation, which is very much different from how we ‘take in’ a wave using our own unaided or unmanipulated vision, affords the viewer options to perceive and process the experience of being seaside, while the fluid intricacies float timelessly in spaces." - Dominick Lombardi, Huffington Post, June 2016 - Currents in Photography, Walter Wickiser Gallery, NY "This is a full-throated trespassing into a mightier, relentless and forebodingly green and cobalt sea, one that Poseidon himself must be churning from icy fathoms below." - Christina Schreil, Queens Chronicle, September 10, 2015 » read full review "Sandra Gottlieb's large-scale photographic seascapes thunder and roar with the dynamic immediacy of the ocean's power viewed close-up, obfuscating the need for traditional pictorial structure. Gottlieb photographs capture momentous waves that hover in space, embodying nature's transitory energy as it prepares to burst into the disintegration of spattered speckled bits of white foam. The images capture the ocean as it breaks into fragments but simultaneously retains the unity of its transforming zones of frothy spray. The force of the sea is seen from within, rather than viewed at a safe distance. Gottlieb investigates the violence and the destructive potential of the ocean to wreak its havoc; the danger and might of the writhing ocean is made abundantly clear. These photographs signal more than a visual experience; they act as a reminder of the untamed wildness that symbolizes the infinity of the ocean's depths. They provide the viewer with a haptic sense of kinetic participation, which defies the expectation commonly held of visual ocean imagery." - Mary Hrbacek, Artes Magazine, January 7, 2015 "Sandra Gottlieb's photographs of waves in the ocean, specifically documented during the month of October, present us with a stage upon which all motion is emotion incarnate, like a canvas upon which the forms are constantly emerging. The lack of a human presence in her images only serves to allow the viewers to place themselves into a relationship with the watery action, which like the painterly dynamic for which it is an obvious stand-in, pulls and pushes us in every direction possible. The strongest impression it gives us is a feeling of overwhelming presence, of what can only be described as sublime; the strength and heaviness of water out in such alien expanses, coupled with its minute and effervescent spray, its rolling waves, crashing only on some shore hundreds of miles distant. There is no way not to feel the very pull of nature's will and the artist's service to its overt authority." - David Gibson, ArtQuips, December 20,2014 "Sandra Gottlieb's powerfully suggestive "October Waves" series pertains to many things. Among them is her inner journey of connectedness with the discourse of the Deep, parsing out the language of water to arrive at something close to revelation." - Dominique Nahas, Curator and Critic based in Manhattan, 2014 » read full review "In Gottlieb's images of the sea, there is a confounding intimacy. The translucence of the waves, the starkness of the white water, the vagueness of the distant fields all create a strange sort of unsteadiness as we process the information before us. Yet these pauses in the action, the collective and collapsing energy…are truly remarkable." - D. Dominick Lombardi, Huffington Post, June 19, 2014 "Gottlieb's pictures are conceptual in nature…capturing moments that are structured to make the observer feel small, accept that one moment is quickly overtaken by another…Extraction of such peak moments from the multitude of moments epitomizes the intensity of Gottlieb's aesthetic, the fruit of an ongoing, and even intimate relationship with the ocean." - Robert Mahoney, Art Critic, New York City 2012 » read full review "Her three most recent bodies of work are remarkable for showing just how different the same stretch of water and sand can look when an artist trains her eye and camera on one of Nature's most glorious and fickle spectacles. Most demonstrate the artist's sharp feel for composition: areas of placid water, pounding surf, and slick sand are as sharply delineated as blocks of color in a Japanese woodprint." - Ann Landi, Images of the Sea, October 2011 » read full review "Gottlieb's attention to natural themes, sensitively conveying their frailty and mutability, is daring in its clarity and sincerity." - Mary Hrbacek, The M Magazine, July 2009 » read full review "Inside that one small flowerbed, Gottlieb discovered both high Baroque drama and quietly minimalist beauty. In just one series, Gottlieb has demonstrated both remarkable powers of observation and a thorough mastery of her medium." - Ann Landi, Artnews, Studio Visit 2008 » read full review "It is hard to imagine a more romantic view of such subject matter, which overwhelms its audience with its restrained, yet powerful radiance." - Jonathan Goodman, Art Critic, New York City 2007 » read full review "Sandra Gottlieb's unique contribution may very well be the stunning synthesis that she achieves between the naturalistic and experimental traditions of modern photography through her singularly austere yet passionate vision." - Lawrence Downes, Gallery and Studio, Aug 2004 » read full review "Sandra Gottlieb's 'One Cloud #2' transforms a straightforward picture of sky and horizon into a meditation on atmosphere." - New York Times, Sunday, Dec 17, 2000 "It is artists such as Gottlieb who make clear why photography can now stand right alongside painting as a major art form." - Gallery and Studio, Sept 1998 |
Winter Garden 2023 » Nos. 1-15 Abstract Jetty 2022 » One thru Twenty December Sunset 2020 » Nos. 1-20 A Cloud Study, Sunset 2016 » Nos. 1-20 October Waves 2013 » Nos. 1-30 Waves In Black and White 2011 » Nos. 1-30 Summer 2009 » Nos. 1-20 » Nos. 21-40 Winter 2009 » Nos. 1-12 Seascapes 1996 thru 2006 » Horizontals Nos. 1-20 » Verticals Nos. 1-20 Résumé » Bio » Reviews » Sizes sandragottliebinfo@me.com 212.688.0908 
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