Richard Learoyd

A Loathing of Clocks and Mirrors

On View
Mar 7 – Apr 26, 2025
New York

Pace is pleased to announce its presentation of new and recent work by photographer Richard Learoyd. On view from March 7 to April 26, 2025, the exhibition will include portraits, still lifes, and landscapes produced between 2018 and 2025.

Pace is pleased to present an exhibition of recent work by photographer Richard Learoyd at its 508 West 25th Street gallery in New York. On view from March 7 to April 26, the exhibition will feature a selection of photographs Learoyd produced with his custom-built camera obscura between 2018 and 2025. Deeply inspired by Dutch Golden Age painting, Learoyd’s latest works take viewers on a journey through intimate moments and intricate details, examining the relationship between subject, light, and space. The photographs on display explore a range of subjects, from hauntingly evocative portraits to still-life compositions that breathe life into the simplest of objects.

Learoyd’s unique photographic processes require an immense degree of technical precision, resulting in incredibly detailed, luminous prints with a tactile richness rarely seen in contemporary photography. Reflecting on the delicate interplay between light, shadow, and form, Learoyd’s work is imbued with a surreal, auratic presence that speaks to his enduring interest in the notion of collective photographic memory—the idea that a picture can be felt and understood on a subconscious level. The artist is renowned for his masterful use of light and his ability to capture the profound depth and stillness of the human experience.

“Light and space have always been central to my work," Learoyd explains. "I want to capture more than just an image; I want to convey a sense of time, intimacy, and presence—things that transcend the immediate and evoke a more timeless feeling."

Highlights in the exhibition, carefully curated by Learoyd, include a photograph of clasped hands, an ode to Alfred Stieglitz’s images of Georgia O’Keeffe’s hands from the first half of the 20th century. Also on view will be the artist’s most recent body of work, a series of photographs created using a new and transformative process of multiple impression printing layered with hand coated gesso on canvas. These multi-dimensional works showcase the artist’s exploration of depth, texture, time, and the relationship between photography and materiality.

In recent years, Learoyd has mounted solo exhibitions at the Fundación Mapfre Casa Garriga Nogués in Barcelona, the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, the Getty Center in Los Angeles, and the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City. His upcoming presentation at Pace in New York will coincide with AIPAD’s 2025 Photography Show at the Park Avenue Armory, where the gallery will organize a special program with the artist—further details will be announced in due course.

Last light, Navajo Point (color) by Richard Learoyd

Cecilia after Subleyras by Richard Learoyd

Drawing with straight lines by Richard Learoyd

Black and White Poppies by Richard Learoyd

About the Artist

Richard Learoyd’s large-scale color and black-and-white portrait, landscape, and still-life photographs are celebrated for their balance of hyper-real and expressive qualities. His in-studio custom-built camera obscura contains two room-like chambers connected by a bellows with an inset lens. Working with Ilfochrome color-reversal paper, Learoyd uses the camera obscura to render a single positive, unique image with minute detail without film negatives or digital technology.

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