Stagy Eden

This may be a problem. The farther away the subjects in Justine Kurland's photographs at Mitchell-Innes & Nash the better the image. In other words, in those images in which mothers with their young children are in the foreground, the photos look stagy and the women appear self-conscious. Kurland set out to create an Eden of naked moms and nursing toddlers, but these gardens of earthly delights work best when their inhabitants are less visible. Who knows? Perhaps that was the artist's intent. (Images Mitchell-Innes & Nash)