Photo by Laura Letinsky, courtesy of the Yancey Richardson Gallery.

Slightly haunting, could be a perfect description in reference to the exhibit, Laura Letinsky: Still Life Photographs, 1997-2012 at the Yancey Richardson Gallery in the Denver Art Museum(DAM).

Letinsky’s work invites you in as a viewer with muted  subtle colors and seems almost ordinary in an  every day sort of way, until that bit of mystery grabs and pulls your curiosity into each piece.

As described by DAM photography curator Eric Paddock,

“Letinsky’s 17 photographs challenge the viewers to keep looking and asking questions about how we see…Although we never see Letinsky or other people, their presence or maybe their absence hovers around the photographs.”

Photo by Laura Letinsky, courtesy of the Yancey Richardson Gallery.

Objects such as silverware or leftover food left on a table mysteriously hover and seem to defy the laws of gravity and reality. Viewers seem invited in without words, to delve deeper into the photos more thoroughly for clues.  Cups that seem to teeter on a tables edge and silverware that seems to be levitating or perhaps in the grasp of some invisible source are eerie and provoke curious thought.

The Canada native is currently a professor at University of Chicago in the Department of Visual Arts.  According to DAM sources,  Letinsky’s photos have been featured at Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, the Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography and the National Museum of Women in the Arts, New York.

Letinsky’s photos will appear at the museum through March 24, 2013 at which time the exhibit will then travel to her alma mater, University of Manitoba School of Art in Winnepeg, Canada. For more information visit www.denverartmuseum.org/press.