Yinon Avior Philipsohn - Torn Suspense

solo exhibition at Tom of Finland Foundation, Los Angeles

In contrast to the classic process of expose–print–display, my photographic work in this project is interlocked with physical presence and the manual labour of sewing, which transforms the photographic surface from a flat image into a tactile body.

Each photographic quilt is a single body, both material and metaphorical, with a unique texture. Beyond the physical volume added through sewing, the glossy finish of the plastic-coated prints produces reflections that interrupt a stable viewpoint. The spectator cannot experience the work as a whole from a single position. The work consists of several photographs layered as broken fragments on top of each other and sewn together, forcing the spectator to follow a deliberately constructed, unwritten choreography. Spatial placement and light function as obstacles rather than neutral conditions, leading to a gradual reveal of the images.

Since 2018, I have developed and worked with photographic quilting using hand-sewn plastic-coated inkjet prints. From 2018 to 2025, the printed images in this process were based on photographs I shot myself. In this series, however, the source material shifts to BDSM pornographic magazines that did not make it to Tom of Finland Foundation’s library due to their condition.

Selected fragments are scanned, enlarged, and reprinted in multiple layers, exposing the mechanics of their own production, such as grain, misregistration, and surface texture, while bodies lose coherence and become material.

Through this process, a model’s body is photographed, printed in a magazine, reused as source material, and reassembled as a quilted object. The work asks how much a human body can endure, how much damage an image can absorb, and how many stitches a print can take before it tears apart.