Thomas Ruff | Nudes

A large-scale monograph devoted to Thomas Ruff’s series titled "Nudes" in which existing imagery is appropriated by downloading images from pornographic “thumbnail galleries” on the Internet and then is enlarged, distorted, and transformed. Literally and figuratively blurring the distinctions between pornography and formalist nude photography, Ruff enhances the artificial atmosphere of the tiny “originals” by boosting their image size exponentially. Accompanying the photographs is an excerpt from a novel by French writer Michel Houellebecq.