Shining a Light on Cuban Photography
Aired Thursday, March 26th at 1pm
Coinciding with the opening of Robert Mann Gallery's exhibition The Light in Cuban Eyes, Madeleine P. Plonsker—who inspired our exhibition and organized the book of the same name—spoke with Leonard Lopate along with artists Nelson Ramirez and Alejandro Pérez. Listen to the interview below or read more online here.
The Cuban art has been marginalized and out of the loop for decades, due to US-Cuban relations. All those years, Cuban artist had opportunities to exhibit and to promote their art mainly in Europe, but the lack of cooperation between the island and its closest neighbor – the US has been causing a serious damage to the Cuban cultural and artistic scene. The situation with Cubans living in the US has been completely different, yet they have always hoped that the isolating wall between these two countries would be demolished. In December, the Obama administration announced tremendous changes regarding US – Cuba relations, with the goal to improve the cooperation between two nations. In this context, Robert Mann Gallery in New York is organizing a group exhibition of contemporary Cuban photography.
Continue reading the article here
Robert Mann Gallery is pleased to announce the representation of Mike Mandel. Born and raised in the San Fernando Valley, Mandel is heavily influenced by the period of expansion and franchising in the Los Angeles region during the 1960s and ‘70s. His photographic series utilize elements of popular media to communicate themes of alienation, commercialization, and personal identity in an increasingly public world.
In the series People in Cars, the artist captures reactions to the sudden intrusion of his camera into the private space of the car, a defining element of Southern California culture after an era of massive freeway expansion. In the tongue-in-cheek Baseball-Photographer Trading Cards, great photographers of the 20th century appear as exchangeable baseball cards complete with satirical stats and quotations. Evidence, a collaboration with Larry Sultan, marked a pivotal change in the idea of photographic authorship and narrative: using found photos carefully culled from the files of government agencies and corporations, the photographers imparted new meaning solely through context. And wonderfully apropros to our contemporary moment, Mandel’s Myself: Timed Exposures can be seen as the original selfies—endearingly awkward, unpretentiously charismatic, and supremely honest about human interactions in the modern age.
Mike Mandel was born in 1950 in Los Angeles. He received an MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute, and currently teaches at the School of the Museum Fine Arts, Boston Studio Program at Tufts University. His work is in permanent collections including those of the Museum of Modern Art; The Center for Creative Photography; The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; The Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena; and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. His published art books include Myself: Timed Exposures, Baseball-Photographer Trading Cards, Evidence (co-authored with Larry Sultan), Making Good Time, and State of Ata, (co-authored with Chantal Zakari), among others. He lives in Watertown, Massachusetts.
Altarations: Built, Blended, Processed
January 15 - February 28, 2015
Ritter Art Gallery, Florida Atlantic University
Boca Raton, Florida
Jennifer Williams' small unique collages and archival pigment prints are featured in Altarations: Built, Blended, Processed, which presents works by 23 contemporary artists. While hardly unified in style and content, the artists’ works in Altarations blend photographic images and processes to produce works that celebrate, contradict and undermine photographic traditions through altered images and references. The title of the exhibition is derived from Mark C. Taylor’s “Altarity,” a 1987 book of philosopher Taylor’s writing that brings together his interpretation and synthesis of several modern philosophers’ interpretations of difference and otherness.
For more information about the exhibition, click here.
Maroesjka Lavigne: Ísland is featured as one of Slate Magazine's top ten photography shows of the year. Jordan G. Teicher writes,
Belgian photographer Maroesjka Lavigne was just 21 when she drove for months across Iceland to create the images in her series, “Island,” which I saw in April at Manhattan’s Robert Mann Gallery. Full of cinematic portraits and snowy landscapes featuring small, isolated subjects, the photos suggest a loose narrative of mystery and melancholy. Though they do justice to the country’s ample natural beauty, they’re way more odd and interesting than anything you’d find in a travel magazine.
To read the full article, click here.
The upcoming book The Light in Cuban Eyes: Lake Forest College's Madeleine P. Plonsker Collection of Contemporary Cuban Photography, which will be accompanied by an exhibition at the gallery in the spring, is listed in Cuban Art News' 'Bookshelf'. This bilingual volume highlights the work of 50 photographers, both emerging and established, who have been active in Cuba from the Special Period to the present, 1992–2012. The photos in the book are accompanied by artists’ statements, collector’s comments, and essays by scholars. Collector Madeleine P. Plonsker observes that “Cuban photography has undergone a dramatic transformation over the past twenty years. Cuba's contemporary photographers are poised to reach a broader international audience, and the intent of my book is to bring you their story.”
For the full article, click here.
Robert Mann is featured as a contributing expert in Artnet's "Market Snapshot: Ansel Adams," in passages such as the below:
...Adams's estate might not see the hysterical fluctuations of other photographers' markets, but that's not to say his work isn't steadily appreciating. “The values have been steadily increasing over the years as the supply in the secondary market diminishes and the demand for his work increases," said Robert Mann, a key player in Adams's secondary market since the 1970s. “Virtually every institutional art collection and many private collections that include photography begin with Adams," he told Artnet via email, “so it is inevitable that the prints will become more scare and ultimately more valuable."
Click here to read more about the current market for Ansel Adams' work, currently on display at Robert Mann Gallery.
Securing Homeland: Rebounding/Rebuilding Sustainable Future
Moderated by exhibition curator Margaret Mathews-Berenson
Panelists: Brian Baer, Cynthia Barton, Deborah Gans, and Mary Mattingly
Dorsky Gallery, Long Island City, NY
Sunday, October 26, 3-4pm
The panel, moderated by the curator, Margaret Mathews Berenson, will focus on innovative solutions to the problems of homelessness and displacement caused by catastrophic natural and manmade disasters that are dramatically presented visually in the works of art in the exhibition. Panelists will discuss innovative projects and proposals by artists, architects, non-profit organizations and government agencies around the world designed to provide housing for those in need. Among these are: post-Katrina housing in New Orleans and rebuilding efforts for victims of Hurricane Sandy in the New York area. Other topics of discussion will be: designing with sustainable materials; urban reclamation projects in Chicago, Houston and Detroit; collaborations between artists, urban design professionals and local communities; and social entrepreneurship in contemporary art and architecture. In conclusion, panelists together with audience participants will contribute ideas and recommendations for addressing these problems in the future. Hand-outs will include a list of organizations worldwide that provide meaningful solutions in the hopes that audience members might be inspired to assist them in meeting their goals.
For more information and to RSVP, click here.
Cig Harvey's deceptively simple photographs tap into the universal elements of the human experience: love, loss, longing and belonging. She's in demand for editorial and commercial work—as well as her for her fine art prints and books.
Two of Cig Harvey's most iconic photographs have one thing in common—they depict a young girl staring back at the photographer with an enigmatic expression.
In Emie in the Truck (2008), a little girl gazes expectantly out the rear window of an old red pickup truck idling in the snow. In Devin and the Fireflies (2011), a different girl in a white dress stands atop a hill at twilight holding a birdhouse as the grass sparks with yellow flashes. The former image, not staged, conjures a sparse, rural life. The latter, carefully planned by Harvey, speaks of innocence in a magical landscape.
Harvey has used Devin in several of her photographs over the years. "She responds to my stare in a way that is confusing," she says. "I am always searching for the look I don't understand. I photograph people I know, but I'm interested in the moment when they respond with a look I don't know."
Harvey works in the space between scripted drama and pure improvisation, taking a conceptual rather than a documentary approach to the people around her. She uses herself, her family and her friends to embody her own ideas and concerns.
Read an excerpt of the article here.
Julie Blackmon started photographing her kids in 2001, after her family moved into a 100-year-old house in Springfield, Missouri, that happened to have a darkroom. She'd dabbled in photography in college and thought it might be worth revisiting. "I really just wanted to get some good black-and-white pictures of my kids that I could put on the wall," she explains. "That was when the Pottery Barn look was in, so I was just trying to make my living room look cool, basically."
Blackmon's own three children are now teenagers and in their early 20s, but she's continued photographing the kids in her hometown: nieces, nephews, and neighbors — "just kids who happen to be around," she says. "We have a kind of little relationship going. We like to work together." This month, a new book, Homegrown, features her most recent work: photographs taken between 2008 and 2014, inspired by the domestic scenes of the Dutch painter Jan Steen, as well as her own chaotic and confusing experiences as a parent.
Blackmon spoke with The Cut about helicopter parenting, living in the same town you grew up in, and how people respond to autobiographical work about motherhood.
Read the full interview and view the slideshow here.
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