© 2007 Taryn Simon - courtesy Gagosian Gallery / Steidl

For this project, Taryn Simon assumes the dual role of shrewd informant and collector of curiosities, compiling an inventory of what lies hidden and out-of-view within the borders of the United States. She examines a culture through careful documentation of diverse subjects from the realms of science, government, medicine, entertainment, nature, security, and religion. Transforming the unknown into a seductive and intelligible form, Simon confronts the divide between those with and without the privilege of access.

Simon makes use of the annotated-photograph's capacity to engage and inform the public. Through text and image, the work underscores the complicated relationship between a photograph and its context. The visual is processed aesthetically and then re-defined by its text.

Her sometimes ethereal, sometimes foreboding compositions, shot with a large-format view camera over a four year period, vary as much as her subject matter, which ranges from radioactive capsules at a nuclear waste storage facility to a black bear in hibernation. In examining that which is integral to America's foundation, mythology and daily functioning, Simon creates a collection of works that reflect and reveal a national identity.

In this exhibition the carefully designed book of the project, published by Steidl, is deconstructed in a spatial presentation of the complete series.