Born in 1945, Tina Barney is renowned for her large-scale colour compositions exploring family dynamics and the social codes of privileged milieus. The six works on display belong to an earlier period of her practice. Made during summer stays in Rhode Island, they reflect a more spontaneous approach, which the artist herself compared to "sketches a painter might make in preparation for a more ambitious composition".
Working with a 35 mm camera and influenced by Lee Friedlander and Garry Winogrand, whom she regards as "masters of unstaged photography", Tina Barney then favoured the snapshot and direct observation. Black and white allowed her to focus her attention on the material qualities of the image, bringing out textures, fabrics, hair, glass surfaces and atmospheric effects.
The faces often remain out of frame, leaving full room for gestures, postures and clothing. Costumes, white dresses and carefully elaborated hairstyles thus become the visible signs of social belonging. These foundational works already reveal the themes that will run through her entire body of work: the conventions that govern human relationships and the subtle structures underlying the sphere of family life.