Perhaps one of the most interesting exhibitions in the BC Scene British Columbian art festival was the very lucid photo exhibition of Scott McFarland. The Vancouver-based photographer has produced what looks like Jeff-Wall inspired staged narratives but while Wall was known for his filmic lighting and set ups, Macfarland employs a heavy element of post production. His simple landscapes, backyards and gardens evoke the crisp northern light and lush surroundings and of their settings (Vancouver and London), and at first glance, one sees richly hued, detailed landscapes bursting with chlorophyll, but there is something just slightly off, slightly surreal. Gazing at a cactus garden (sandy white soil dotted with round knob like echinocereus cacti), it becomes possible to discern the meddlesome hand of the artist at play. The shadows of the cacti appear to fall at all different angles - a scenario impossible in nature but made possible through the magic of Photoshop.

Like a figurative painter, Macfarland arranges pictoral elements how he pleases giving his work an eerie disjointedness - a twisting of the space time dimension. In one shot, for instance, we see a group of porcupines in a zoo in Berlin. Their Mohawked coiffes and showy quilled haunches add an element of majesty, contrasted by middleclass families bundled up in drab winter wear. We look at the two groups of porcupines and the two groups of people and wonder if they did occupy the same space in time or if they were sewn into this narrative by the hand of the photographer. Our eyes rove the richly detailed surfaces of his prints, searching the shadows in vain for a crack - a bit of sloppy Photoshopping - which would give us a clue to their manufactured nature.  But MacFarland is fastidious and that's what makes him so intriguing.

--Rebecca Catching

(*Images, from top to bottom: Scott McFarland, Echinocactus grusonii, 2006, from the series Empire, ink jet print, Private Lenders, Photo: Courtesy of the artist, Monte Clark Gallery and Regen Projects.

Scott McFarland, On the Terrace Garden, Joe and Rosalee Segal with Cosmos atrosanguineus, 2004, from the series Gardens, Chromogenic print, Courtesy of the Artist and Union Gallery, Photo: Courtesy of the artist, Monte Clark Gallery and Regen Projects.

Scott McFarland, Orchard View, Late Spring; Vitis vinifera, Wisteria, 2004, from the series Gardens, Chromogenic print, Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography, Ottawa, © Scott McFarland.)