After intimate studies of domestic brutishness and banal architecture, Richard Billingham’s latest series is an effective, poetic denunciation of captivity. Entering the gallery, visitors are charmed by distinguished and eloquent animals’ calls. The show, descriptively titled “Zoo,” features five large-scale color coupler prints and four videos made in zoos around the world; each is presented in different sizes and formats to underline the integrity of each work and the specificity of its subject. The videos offer extreme close-ups, confronting viewers with an exasperated, restless elephant, a tapir, and a kea whose expression is best described as suffering. The insistence on facial details somewhat decontextualizes the animals. They appear frantic and panicky, as if their situation has killed any instinct or natural behavior. Seal, 2006, the most suggestive work, depicts a tranquil, light-blue underwater scene suddenly and repeatedly broken by the animal’s furious passage through the frame. The cadence is unnaturally precise. The seal has been trapped in a demented loop, and a deep sense of monotony is expressed through this sophisticated formal decision. A sense of claustrophobia characterizes the whole series, which encourages not easy emotional identification but rather personal engagement. Yet it remains touching work.
