Portraits: Roderick Buchanan

Portraiture has always been a feature of Roderick Buchanan’s photographic and film and video work. This survey publication, released to coincide with the artist’s solo exhibition at Camden Arts Centre, London (22 September – 13 November 2005) traces a number of portrait pieces produced over the course of a career that now spans almost sixteen years. Encompassing classic early photo-series such as “Coast to Coast Dennistoun”, and “Yankees” (1996) and ending on recent film works such as “Harriers” (2002) and “History Painting” (2005), the book presents a collection of faces, highlighting Buchanan’s preoccupation with the codes and iconographies of cultural allegiance and identity and his equally insistent focus on the individual subject as part of a wider field of social and cultural relationships. Featuring a keynote essay by the acclaimed art critic Jan Verwoert and an introduction by Steven Bode, “Portraits” acts as a stimulating visual primer to Buchanan’s consistently engaging and richly rewarding practice.
In amongst its vivid procession of memorable portrait images, it also introduces a number of new historical/genealogical pieces that extend the definition of the (time-based) portrait into more social/conceptual areas.