Christy Lee Rogers: OTHERWORDLY

Arts Editor: Christopher George 

Like most during this period, Rogers has spent much time close to home. Fueled by the events around the world she's taken this opportunity to dive in to her latest underwater collection, Human.

Drama, movement and light come to life in swirls of color, set against the darkness of night in Rogers' depiction of the strength and opposing vulnerability of humanity. With many public exhibitions closed indefinitely, she decided to release this collection online, one image a month, with complimentary outdoor installations around the world. The first being in London on the streets of the design district, with 20 foot outdoor images posted along the walkways.

The name human was selected to presuppose a coming together of humanity into a modern renaissance, kindled by adversity and tribulation, and flowering into unforeseen new realities. If art was a passageway into the soul and something more profound within ourselves, she reminds us of our own vulnerabilities within a landscape of hope and magic.  In Rogers' unique way, she urges us to look beyond the finite boundaries of what's in front of us, and to see between the spaces into a new future. 

All of her works are photographed in water, using the refraction of light to create painterly images, and often compared with Baroque and Renaissance paintings.  The water within the images flows life to all areas, taking on bold curving forms and transforming everyday people into angelic creatures, seemly from some other place. In these works Rogers hypothesizes the idea that if photons of light are without mass and only perceived because of the eyes, then there must be other things around us that we can not perceive of as of yet.  ​

In 2019 Christy Lee Rogers was selected as Open Photographer of the Year for the Sony World Photography Awards. She is a two time finalist for the Contemporary Talents Award from the Fondation François Schneider in France, and has been commissioned by Apple to create underwater images with the iPhone 11Pro, as well as being featured in one of their behind-the-scenes process films. The Independent of London compared her underwater photography to the works of Caravaggio, Delacroix, Rubens and Titian. CNN mentions "Rogers is changing the way water is used in photography to create images that can easily be mistaken for paintings and that push the boundaries of reality."

Christy Lee Rogers