Big Picture Stories is a grouping of Noël Wells’ point-and-shoot film photographs. Wells, a self-taught photographer, began taking pictures as a way of capturing the stories she was seeing all around her, focusing on scenes of melancholic isolation, daily ironies, accidental narratives of light and color, and comical scenarios.

Never wanting to disturb a moment, she leaned into taking photos from a removed perspective, often proscenium style. With a mix of street photography, personal documentation, and her penchant for anthropromorphizing objects and landscapes, this series reflects her birds-eye-view of the world around her, often moving away from details and capturing a broader play-like narrative, asking you to see the larger context, whether within the frame or the questions begged outside of it.

How to View

During the day, the installment can be viewed on monitors inside the ICP Museum and during evening hours, images are literally “projected” onto the windows of the ICP Museum; they can be viewed from the sidewalk outside the Museum and are most visible after sunset. Learn more about Projected.

About the Artist

Noël Wells is an actor, writer, and director currently residing in Los Angeles, best known for her work on “Saturday Night Live” and “Master of None,” as well as for her directorial debut film “Mr. Roosevelt.” While working professionally in the entertainment industry, she has continued other pursuits including photography, music, illustration, and animation.