Paul Mpagi Sepuya: Focus Desire

"The photographs are queer not only because of the bodies that inhabit them, but because Sepuya's combinations embrace a variety of meanings."--Artforum

In his portraits and studio photographs, the American artist and photographer Paul Mpagi Sepuya (born 1982) blends sensual intimacy with visual precision. Capturing intimate encounters with friends-cum-collaborators, Sepuya scrupulously constructs compositions that insist on queer and Black subjectivity in photography. Through the deliberate placement of mirrors, fabrics and studio props, Sepuya stages a seductive interplay of exposure and concealment as he engages bodies and gazes in a dynamic web of relations--reflected, refracted, fragmented, multiplied and woven into new configurations. By laying bare the act of photographing, Sepuya pulls viewers into the complex dynamics of looking and desire, which he continually negotiates and subtly shifts.
Featuring works from early and recent series, this paperback includes extensive ephemera drawn from the artist's personal archive as well as a collection of commissioned essays.