Scott McFarland works at the point of transition between analog and digital technologies. Where analog photography is often discussed as a representation of a decisive moment, McFarland’s photographs are constructed from many images, taken at different times and under different conditions. The resulting composite images render familiar places and subjects visually complex through repetition and assemblage. His subtle manipulations of the photograph and use of tableau scale offer the viewer a new perspective on the photograph as a single moment in time. McFarland has expanded the subjects of his works in recent years from the large-scale tableaux gardens in Vancouver, for which he is perhaps best known, to winter scenes, cottage country outside the city and the urban street.

The most comprehensive book on Scott McFarland's work to date, Snow, Shacks, Streets, Shrubs offers reproductions of several of McFarland’s recent large-scale, wide-format photographic series as well as a generous representation of his earlier series, including Boathouse (2002–2006), Gardens (2002–2006), Laboratory (2008–2009), Empire (2005–2007), Niagara (2009), Sans Souci (2010–2011), and Repatriation (2011–2014). This lavishly illustrated volume presents the artist’s sustained consideration of the history of photography and the sophisticated technical changes that the medium has undergone.

Accompanying the reproductions are essays by Kitty Scott, former curator of Modern and Contemporary Art at the Art Gallery of Ontario, independent curator and critic Urs Stahel, and a wide-ranging interview with McFarland by the American photographer James Welling.

Kitty Scott has held positions as Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto; Director of Visual Arts, The Banff Centre, Banff; Chief Curator, the Serpentine Gallery, London, and Curator of Contemporary Art at the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa. As an arts educator, she has been a visiting professor for the Curatorial Practice Program at the California College of the Arts, San Francisco; as well as an adjunct professor at York University, Toronto, and the University of British Columbia, Vancouver.
Scott has curated many significant exhibitions, and was an agent for dOCUMENTA (13) (2012), Kassel. She was the Canadian coordinator for the Seventh International Istanbul Biennial (2001), and also worked on the inaugural SITE Santa Fe Biennial (1995). She organized the curatorial symposium Are Curators Unprofessional? (2010) at The Banff Centre, and edited the resulting publication Raising Frankenstein: Curatorial Education and Its Discontents (2010). Scott has written extensively on contemporary art for catalogues and journals including Parachute, Parkett, Mousse, and Canadian Art. She has written texts for multiple monographic publications; and contributed to numerous books on curatorial studies, including the publication Creamier: Contemporary Art in Culture (2010).

Kitty Scott's profile page

Urs Stahel is a freelance writer, curator, lecturer, and consultant. Among his current roles are curator at Manifattura di Arti, Sperimentazione e Tecnologia (MAST), Bologna, Italy; consultant for the MAST collection of industrial photography; adviser to the Vontobel Art Collection and Foto Colectania, Barcelona, Spain. He was the Co-Founder of Fotomuseum Winterthur, Switzerland, where he worked as director and curator between 1993 and 2013. He lives in Zurich.

Urs Stahel's profile page

Scott McFarland lives and works in Toronto, Canada. His works are included in public collections such as the MoMA, J. Paul Getty Museum, National Gallery of Canada, SFMoMA, Walker Art Center, and Victoria & Albert Museum. In 2014 the Art Gallery of Ontario exhibited McFarland’s solo exhibition Snow, Shacks, Streets, Shrubs. More recently his series Lens Cleaning was included in David Campany’s touring exhibition A Handful of Dust (2019–21).

Scott McFarland's profile page

James Welling is an American photographer known for his color-filtered and digitally manipulated photographs. Throughout his practice, Welling often focuses on locations that were personally or historically meaningful, particularly landscapes and architecture such as Phillip Johnson’s seminal Glass House. He explores both ambiguity and skepticism while maintaining a deeply formal process that connects the legacy of Conceptual Art to the technical practice of photography. Born in 1951 in Hartford, CT, Welling went on to study at the California Institute of the Arts under notable professors such as John Baldessari. Welling’s work is represented in the permanent collections of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York, the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, and the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris, among others. He resides in New York City.

James Welling's profile page