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It happens to the best of postmodern photographers; at a certain age they give up cultural play and go for introspective new-age spirituality. At the tender age of 32, Melanie Schiff, who gained repute for her sportive performance shots, has made the great mid-life transition, presenting us with color images of landscapes and concrete and rock formations that—it must be said—favor blasted and graffiti-laden subjects that serve as “mirrors” of her soul, which has decidedly not yet passed into bucolic serenity. The viewer is the beneficiary of Schiff’s discontent and is treated to such delights as a view through a derelict underpass scrawled with fading aerosol tags and bathed in the red of dried blood. Rest assured, however, there is the hot light of a gray sky beckoning in the distance—the boulevard of broken dreams, leading to a clouded peace. (Michael Weinstein)
Through October 24 at Kavi Gupta Gallery, 835 W. Washington
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