Ed Sappin | Philanthropy & Community

Giving & Volunteering

Forever Paris: Willy Ronis’s Striking Style

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Amoureux de la Colonne Bastille, Paris, 1957

Amoureux de la Colonne Bastille, Paris, 1957

Willy Ronis passed away in 2009, leaving a long, dense catalog of photographs that chronicle France and Paris’ rich history during the twentieth century, particularly the post war years of the 1940s and 1950s.

Born in Paris in 1910, Ronis did not become a full-time photographer until his mid 30s. He was part of the well known Rapho Agency alongside fellow luminaries Brassai and Robert Doisneau. Ronis’s work focuses on the joy and love of day to day life.

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Le Petit Parisien, 1953 | Courtesy: Jackson Fine Art

Ronis’ stature grew in the 1950s as he was part of an exhibit in New York at the MOMA curated by Edward Steichen and a few years later was part of the famed Family of Man exhibition. His works began to enter major collections and throughout his lifetime he was well represented by major galleries around the world.

“Je n’ai jamais poursuivi l’insolite, le jamais vu, l’extraordinaire, mais bien ce qu’il y a de plus typique
dans notre existence quotidienne… ” Willy Ronis

“I have never pursued the unusual, the unseen, the extraordinary, but what is most typical
In our everyday existence … ” Willy Ronis

Ronis is very well known in his native land but never quite achieved the international fame that some of his contemporaries did, perhaps because (ironically) he was too positive in his outlook. This being said, he remains one of my favorite photographers for his ability to capture the everyday and its beauty and maintain a positive outlook in the aftermath of the destruction of World War II.

Nature, Technology and Humanity through the Worlds of Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison

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In 2007, I was living in Shanghai and decided to come back to the US for a visit to see my family in New York. I also passed through Chicago to attend the law school commencement of a cousin living there. Trudging through the winter in Chicago was actually fun (my cousin graduated midyear). I had some free time during the trip and visited the Catherine Edelman Gallery in River North, where I first saw the works of Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison.

I was taken with the worlds the ParkeHarrison’s depicted in their bleak photographic works – the environment suffering greatly, often with an everyman trying to help heal some of the ills that have befallen Mother Nature.

Earth Elegies by Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison (from the artists’ website)

Earth Elegies by Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison (from the artists’ website)

The ParkeHarrisons became one of my favorites from that day onwards. Their statement is one of alarm, concern and warning of the world we live in and where it may lead:

We  create works in response to the ever-bleakening relationship linking humans, technology, and nature. These works feature an ambiguous narrative that offers insight into the dilemma posed by science and technology’s failed promise to fix our problems, provide explanations, and furnish certainty pertaining to the human condition.  Strange scenes of hybridizing forces, swarming elements, and bleeding overabundance portray Nature unleashed by technology and the human hand.  

Rich colors and surrealistic imagery merge to reveal the poetic roots of the works on display.  The use of color is intentional but abstract; proportion and space are compositional rather than natural; movement is blurred; objects and people juxtaposed as if by chance in a visual improvisation that unfolds choreographically.  At once formally arresting and immeasurably loaded with sensations—this work attempts to provide powerful impact both visually and viscerally. 

– Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison (as posted on the artists’ website)

While their artistic statement expresses great concern of a potentially apocalyptic future, the ambiguity in their statement also points to the ability to correct our course and become better stewards of the land. On that day in Chicago, I was particularly taken with Gray Dawn, a dreary, contemplative work. Our everyman lays on a bed, asleep still or waking we do not know, with a dirty window in front of him and a scene outside dominated by a power plant or industrial facility. However, there are signs of life, of Mother Nature, as plant trimmings sprouting in the foreground point to another dawn.

Gray Dawn by Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison (from the Catherine Edeleman Gallery website)


Gray Dawn by Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison (from the Catherine Edeleman Gallery website)

The ParkeHarrisons are well represented by major galleries in New York, Chicago, and Colorado and their works have been included in the permanent collections of institutions including the Whitney, the National Museum of American Art in Washington, DC and the Museum of Arts in Boston. If you have a chance to see their creations I highly recommend it.

 

The Brilliance of Michael Kenna

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This is the first of a series profiling some of my favorite artists, living or past.

Michael Kenna is a rare modern photographer – his work is both lauded by the art world and has crossed over into the mainstream market. You can walk into some of the most rarefied galleries in the US or abroad and see his original prints, or go on to Overstock and buy a framed poster. What is the appeal?

Kenna creates ethereal, beautiful landscapes with high contrast, and small format. His works jewel boxes, taking us along for a trip to see the world around us anew.

Ed Sappin - Japanese art

Winter Sun, Kami Oumu, Hokkaido, Japan. 2004

Born in Lancashire, England and currently residing in Seattle, Washington, Kenna is best known for his works of Asia, specifically Japan. He is also an accomplished commercial photographer who has worked with some of the world’s leading brands. On the more serious front, Kenna has also turned his lens to subjects including concentration camps and the changing landscape of the Middle East. His image below of the railway lines at Birkenau is haunting and beautiful, a counterpoint to the horrors that took place in this slice of the Polish countryside.

Ed Sappin -Railway Lines

Railway Lines and Entry Building, Birkenau, Poland, 1992

Kenna is represented by a who’s who of galleries around the world and is often the subject of individual and part of group exhibitions. Next time you have an opportunity to see his work in a city near you, I highly recommend it.

Traveling Exhibits at the ICP Museum

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The International Center for Photography, which I’ve written about before, showcases exhibitions that travel to and from venues worldwide. Because of this “traveling exhibition” feature, ICP’s exhibits are worldly and intermittent; since the photographs featured tour the world, they are viewed by people of all ages, ethnicities and nationalities. This makes it all the more impactful to get a glimpse as New York takes its turn.

At the ICP there is currently a traveling exhibition called The Mexican Suitcase, a collection gives the public a chance to experience rare images recovered from negatives from the Spanish Civil War. In 2007, three boxes of 4,500 35mm negatives considered lost since 1939 arrived at the ICP. The photographs were taken by three photographers, Robert Capa, Gerda Taro, and Chim (David Seymour.) These men — who lived in Paris and worked in Spain — laid the foundation for modern war photography.

Their coverage of the Spanish Civil War is considered uniquely innovative and passionate — The New York Times has a great review of the exhibit for those that want to know a bit more. The article describes the lives and struggles of the artists and the story the exhibit tells of their lives and works. Described are the three boxes, “timeworn but intact,” a tattered telegram, notebooks, and many images of everyday Spanish life during the war. Here’s an excerpt:

This total immersion, made possible by increasingly hand-held cameras, generated huge numbers of images. And that’s what you get in this show: hundreds and hundreds of tiny pictures lined up edge to edge on contact sheets to create a display of a kind that museumgoers rarely encounter but that photographers see all the time: squint-inducing, unedited, in progress.

Another traveling exhibit, which unfortunately ended on July 31, is Capa in Color, a glimpse at the famous photojournalist’s colored photography, most of which captured life postwar. The exhibit showcased over 100 contemporary color prints that demonstrate how Capa adapted to color photography and a new postwar sensibility.

Seeing as the traveling exhibits inherently change up, it’s worth checking in every so often to see what’s featured. Some exhibits are only briefly showcased, while others, like the Mexican Suitcase, span four months or more. If you’re a photography enthusiast like me, there’s a good chance you’ll be delighted. After all, photography is an artform that documents a singular moment. It makes sense that exhibits would be transient, too.

Pushing the Boundaries of Photography: The New ICP Museum

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On Thursday, June 22, the relocated International Center of Photography opened at its new home in New York City at 250 Bowery. As a photographer, the opening of this museum has been on my radar for a while now, and from what I’ve heard it does not disappoint. That is, unless you’re expecting traditional photography. The first exhibit is decidedly much edgier than that.

Called “Public, Private, Secret,” the New York Times says that this exhibit shows how the ICP has been renovated for the so-called “selfie age.”  In its ultra-modern 11,000 square foot space, with an all-glass street-level facade (erasing any inside privacy) it would seem that the architecture matches the artwork in this respect.

Organized by Charlotte Cotton, the museum’s first curator in residence, “Public, Private, Secret” explores the way that public image collides with self identity. This, I think, is very fitting in an age where everyone with a smartphone has become a photographer and social branding expert in their own right. Rather than treating the everyday selfie as art, the work showcased is elevated and conceptual: cameras capture museumgoers and turn their images into a pixelated display, art is created out of found footage from social media, to name just two examples.

The ICP’s Bowery debut comes after a move from Midtown Manhattan, its home for many years. The museum has an interesting history: it was originally founded in 1974 by photographer Cornell Capa, who was concerned with upkeeping the legacy of what he called “concerned photography” — photography with a humanitarian impulse bent on having social impact on the world. Capa started ICP after leading the legendary Magnum Photos. Since ICP’s founding, it’s become one of the world’s leading institutions dedicated solely to photography and the visual arts.

The concerned photographer expresses “genuine human feeling predominates over commercial cynicism or disinterested formalism.” This opening exhibit is a portrayal of human feelings as they exist in a digital era, where the line between public and private is as thin as you want it to be, and sometimes erased altogether.  

But what I find especially great about ICP is that it’s more than just a museum. I took my first formal photography courses there when the museum was based on the Upper East Side. Throughout its history, ICP has engaged the surrounding community, including schools and public programs, and photography is brought to the forefront instead of treated as an afterthought as you sometimes see in art museums. I can’t wait to visit ICP in its new home, as it continues to break boundaries and impact visitors through careful curation, outreach, and innovation.