NXT 
Instagram is helping downgrade the way we view photography. Since the beginning the viewing platform of photography keeps getting minimized from gallery walls, to coffee table books, to quality print magazines, to now, tiny digital squares on a handheld device that we absorb into our brains for all of 0.1 seconds. It’s a disgrace to beautiful photography.
Enter Atiba Jefferson and his ‘Heart-Shaped Box’ exhibition at HVW8 Gallery. The celebrated skate and culture photographers work is gracing 8-ft illuminated cubes. What up now Instagram!!! And not many photographers are diverse enough to have top level skateboarders, NBA players, rockers, and rappers all up and personal.
HVW8 Gallery and Adidas Originals are pleased to present ‘Heart-Shaped Box’, an immersive exhibition of photography by Atiba Jefferson. Assembling large-scale lightbox cubes of Atiba’s iconic images, ‘Heart-Shaped Box’ establishes an interactive environment that shines a new light on the renowned photographer’s continually evolving practice. The show configures four lightboxes in a black-painted gallery space, illuminated from within to reveal a sublime view of Atiba’s portraits, action shots and cityscapes, while drawing attention to the essential component of light throughout the photographic process.
‘Heart-Shaped Box’ celebrates twenty years of Atiba’s photography. Keeping it fresh, the show collates images from his more recent archives, some of which have never been viewed beyond the dimensions of an iPhone screen. The installation presents digital and analogue work across five facades of the 8 foot lightbox cubes, enabling new dialogues to occur between the images when the structures are observed from different perspectives. “This collection of photos is how I view photography,” Atiba explains. “I like things to be different—from my lighting, format, angles and the same goes for my subjects. It’s not just skateboarding, it’s not just music, it’s not just people. It’s all the things I love.”
