‘Happy birthday Louise Parker II’: enter the world of Roe Ethridge

The American photographer Roe Ethridge isn’t precious about titles. For his latest exhibitions with Gagosian, recently opened in Gstaad and London (through 8 and 28 September, respectively), he made an inventory of various labels. ‘I made a list of the most prominent themes of selected images,’ he clarifies, recounting over email how he arrived at the moniker for this new pair of shows, ‘Happy Birthday Louise Parker II’. ‘First was “Louise Parker”, then “Birthday” came in at second or third, and immediately the phrase “Happy Birthday Louise Parker” came to mind. I had always imagined the portrait of her sitting in the red chair [Louise in a Chair for Double (2015)] as a picture of her at her imaginary birthday party.’

Parker, whose image is the central though not sole motif of the two shows – described by the gallery as ‘a pair of different but interconnected selections’ – has been a part of Ethridge’s orbit since the early 2010s, when she was streetcast for an editorial he was shooting. ‘She was a student of Stephen Shore at Bard college and was already aware of what I was up to as a photographer,’ he shares. ‘We never talked about it much, the collaboration has always been pretty effortless. She’s actually coming to Gstaad on 22 August, which coincides with the big Polo match [The Hublot Polo Gold Cup] in the city. We are hoping to make a picture of her with the Polo match in the background!’

Adapted from a previous show in Milan (‘Happy Birthday Louise Parker’), which opened the gallery at 10 Corso Cosmo in February 2024 and was curated by Alessandro Rabottini, the displays in Gstaad and London are typical of the photographer’s fugue approach to curating and image-making more broadly, a defining characteristic of his decades-long career, in which his work has comfortably straddled in tandem the arenas of the commercial and the personal. ‘I love the idea of the fugue as a sort of musical guide to the sequencing,’ he notes. ‘It’s like a multitude of little dialectal moments that create third things and hopefully those third things turn into chords or passages.’

In addition to those of Parker, in Gstaad and London there are portraits of friends and family members and still lifes made for brands and publications.

‘Alessandro was instrumental in the concept of the [10 Corso Como] show,’ says Ethridge, recalling the formation of the Milan installation, ‘weaving in the personal and commercial images with Louise as an iconic refrain. He and I have known each other for years. We worked together on every aspect of the show, and I think it’s a testament to working with a great curator that the show was generous in what it delivered and how it worked in the context of Corso Cosmo.’

This interest in collaboration stretches beyond his work with Parker and Rabottini, and elements of ‘Happy Birthday Louise Parker II’ were similarly shaped by his friends, suggests Ethridge. Take Louise on David’s Refrigerator (2012-20), an image of a worn print affixed at the corners with magnets: ‘My friend David Jimenez, who produced the images of Louise on Brass with me, had that invite poster of Louise on his refrigerator for ten years or so and sent me that image,’ offers the photographer. ‘I loved it so much I just enlarged the file he sent. It feels natural to me to have themes or subjects return over time, it’s something photography is particularly suited for.’

Indeed, this backstory recalls Refrigerator, 1999, a photograph of his mother’s busy fridge front originally made on assignment. It subsequently opened his 2022 monograph American Polychronic, and Ethridge has since described it as a self-portrait.

‘I love the new still life image in the Davies Street show [in London], it depicts a sort of waspy poolside scene with a Loro Piana handbag,’ he continues, highlighting Loro Piana Bag for Vanity Fair, 2024, a vivid poolside scene featuring, alongside the Italian leather and wicker bag, a beachball, cube of ice and a large shell.

‘The set and props were handled by Andy Harmon, who was also the set and prop guy for the Comme des Garçons still life and the duck for Burberry (he and I have had a long collaboration). It wasn’t until I made the big print that I realised the engraving on the little gold lock of the bag has the letters “LP”. Same as the initials of Louise Parker!’

'Happy Birthday Louise Parker II' is at Gagosian in Gstaad and London, through 8 and 28 September, respectively.

gagosian.com