American photographer Catherine Opie’s new show at the National Portrait Gallery begins – or ends, depending on which order you explore it in – with her “interventions”. These photographic portraits are installed between the gallery’s paintings of Victorian leaders, captains, artists and politicians. They sit alongside them as though somewhat familiar.
This familiarity is, in part, down to the formal qualities of Opie’s portraits. It is also due to the depth of the prints, and to the ways in which the National Portrait Gallery appears to acquaint everyone on its walls with everyone else.
Most of Opie’s photos, however, are on display in another space that resembles a miniaturised version of the gallery. Prints hang in rooms and along constructed corridors that are reminiscent of both a domestic space and a museum. As well as portraits, there are cinematic images of American football fields; players standing during a break in play, or seen in practice. Also on show is a portrait of the ocean, the horizon almost indistinct from the grey-blue sky. Five small figures float in the middle distance, sitting on surfboards.
