Fragments, Photographs 1981–1985 captures a formative period in the career of Roy Arden, one of Canada’s most influential contemporary artists. In this series, Arden utilizes a 6×6 medium-format camera to document the “unremarkable” textures of Vancouver’s urban landscape. Moving away from the spontaneity of 35mm street photography, these color transparencies represent a search for a “lyrical but realist poetry” within the gutters, sidewalks, and weathered surfaces of the city. The book includes a profound essay by Peter Culley and detailed notes by Arden himself, offering insight into the intellectual and aesthetic foundations of the Vancouver School of conceptual photography.
