If you've seen Napoleon Dynamite, you already know Aaron Ruell. He played Kip, the nerdy older brother who meets his soul mate Lafawnduh through an online dating service. What you may not know about Ruell is that he's also a talented photographer whose color-saturated interior scenes are funny, strange, and touching.
Most of the portraits show a single person — often a child — held still within an over-the-top room. The wallcoverings are dazzling: flocked green patterns, glittery wallpapers, rough-hewn logs, or wood paneling against heavy drapery. The people seem lonely and immovably fixed within their settings — one woman in a feather dress is literally chained to the sconces on the wall.
Ruell uses a Hasselbad 500, an H2, and a Canon 5D to shoot his portraits, which will be on view from May 7 to June 1 at Martine Chaisson Gallery. For more information visit MartineChaissonGallery.com or Aaron Ruell Photography.
EXHIBITION INFORMATION
Aaron Ruell at Martine Chaisson Gallery
727 Camp Street, New Orleans 70130
May 7 - June 1, 2011, open Tuesday - Saturday, 11am-5pm
504.302.7942, martinechaissongallery@gmail.com
Photos: Aaron Ruell
100 DIY Ideas for the 3-Day Weekend
Danielle's Charming, Classic Walk-Up
Good Food to Share 
The Big Book of Small, Cool Spaces 
Apartment Therapy Presents 
The Eight-Step Home Cure 
White Enamel Flatwa...
How To Cook Fluffy, Tasty Quinoa
Perfect Summer Cocktail Recipe: Honey Bourbon Lemonade
For me, they are fine as artistic installations for photographic purposes but unbearable as spaces to live in. In that context, I like the sets. But on a living space, it is not my cup of tea: they are "overloaded" (is this correct?) of colors, furnitures or details. This is oppressing. If I pick appart one element or two and put them aside, then those items are more interesting to integrate into another space.
The first picture especially reminds me of "Decorno", a photo set that is, primarily, of naked women lying on their couches. BUT the composition of the photographs displays some very cool, very symmetrical interiors.
Definitely not safe for work, but definitely interior decorating related:
Decorno
Love it. Interior design segues into art. Cyrille, I think it's meant to be oppressive. Notice how everything is so orderly and controlled. That woman chained to her scones. She's trapped in a certain type of life. Love those pink glittery walls by the wall.
This is a fun out of the ordinary post. Thanks, AT.
I heart Kip and I love this!
Great job, Aaron! Right in that same satirical vein as David Byrne's True Stories, perhaps even Gregory Crewdson.
Very cool and interesting.
And Ottawawinter, I also relly like "Decorno".
Very cool thanks :)
Pink glitter walls, oh my god. I need those in my life.
Weird and wonderful, kind of Twin Peaks-like. Was he involved with set decoration on Napoleon D.?
I second twin peaks... if the little boy in the second to last one had a mug of coffee...
stunning shots......blown away by the glitter pink wall and the green and blue room....mayjah!!!!
Ottawawinter, thanks for posting that Decorno site, the photographer does amazing work and takes hipster porn to a whole new level.
I had the great pleasure of working in a lab that did some work for him. You truly have to see these images large scale to appreciate the intricacy of detail he puts into these. Incredible work from a truly talented artist.
Love the tea party photo. And those pink glitter walls, oh my sweet loveliness...
the photos are great, but interiors...well lets just say it is not my cup of tea ;)