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'TRIPTERAL' TO SHOW AT SHEEHAN GALLERY
Whitman Pioneer
http://whitmanpioneer.com/arts/2010/02/24/ tripteral/
Feb 25 2010
On Tuesday, March 2, "Tripteral: Three Photographic Views" goes up
in the Sheehan Gallery, followed in the next few days by a series
of lectures and workshops related to the exhibits. "Tripteral" is
comprised of three separate exhibits all related to photography.
Tripteral is an architectural term used to describe a building
supported by three columns. Similarly, the exhibits, like columns,
can stand independently but are all related to the same theme.
"All three of the exhibits deal with photography in some way. Each
stands by itself as a separate exhibition but they also function
together," said Dawn Forbes, director of the Sheehan Gallery. "[The
exhibits] support this idea of photography as a generative practice
and a way of processing issues of culture and memory, history and
identity."
The first exhibition is "Memory Denied: The Photography of Kathryn
Cook." Associate Professor of History Elyse Semerdjian, who curates
the exhibition, received funding through the Ashton J. and Virginia
Graham O'Donnell Visiting Professorship in Global Studies Endowment
to bring Cook's photography to Whitman. Cook took the photos, which
document the Armenian genocide trail, while traveling with Semerdjian,
who accompanied her as a translator.
Forbes describes Cook's motivation for documenting the trail as a
desire to preserve and present memories in the face of the Turkish
government's denial.
"There was a genocide that occurred [in Turkey] starting in 1915. [As
with] a lot of genocides . . . governmental regimes have changed,
revisionists have come in, and now there is a denial that this event
ever happened and a lot of the documentation about this genocide has
been destroyed," said Forbes. "So [Cook] traveled the trail following
what documentation remains and took pictures at sites as they exist
in contemporary times, based on records of places where things had
occurred."
The second exhibition, "Resistance and Rescue in Denmark: Photography
by Judy Ellis Glickman," also deals with genocide. Senior history
major Seth Bergeson became aware of the exhibition through the
non-governmental organization Humanity in Action, which focuses on
human and minority rights. In 2008 Bergeson received a fellowship to
work with Humanity in Action, studying human rights and the Holocaust
and conducting research in Washington, D.C. at the Holocaust Memorial
Museum. Bergeson then worked in Denmark, where he found out about
the Glickman exhibition. Originally sponsored by Humanity in Action,
the exhibition is touring over 150 locations in the United States,
France, England, Denmark and Israel. Bergeson then helped bring the
Glickman exhibition to the Sheehan Gallery. Glickman's work captures
the aftermath of Denmark's attempts to save its Jewish citizenry. The
exhibition contains photographic portraits taken of Danish Holocaust
resistors and the people they saved juxtaposed with photographs of
concentration camps in Eastern Europe.
"We sort of have this contrasting of survival and death, and the
difference between what happens when one resists a cultural genocide
and when one participates in it," Forbes said of the exhibit. "It's
very powerful work to have."
Bergeson sees the exhibit as exemplary of Humanity in Action's mission
to work towards social action.
"[Humanity in Action] is ultimately trying to empower people through
these histories [of resistance] to really critically look at history
and how western democracies have allowed these horrendous events to
happen and how we can prevent them in the future," he said.
The third exhibition is "Photo-bookworks," curated by artist David
Schulz, who taught in the fall as a visiting professor from Pratt
Institute's College of Art. The exhibit will feature a number of
artists' photo-bookworks from the Special Collections department in
Penrose Library, as well as selected prints from the books.
"It's really a look at what a photo-bookwork is and how photographic
images can be read, and looking at the way in which that technology
is evolving," explained Forbes. "What we're excited about with his
exhibition is that he's producing a very limited edition artist
photo-book catalog to accompany his curation project."
Schulz's fascination with photo-bookworks started when he was teaching
at Pratt.
"I was teaching photography and graphic design and I started bringing
together examples with specific kinds of visual motifs, like a series
or an index or a narrative or collage. I started to bring together
books to show my students examples of these kinds of motifs, and as I
started bringing together more of these books and sort of refining the
list I also started finding that a lot of these books kind of embodied
visual and verbal experience, not just visual things," he said.
For Schulz, much of the power of the photo-bookworks lies in the
arrangement and composition of the images within the books.
"When you see this kind of repetition it starts to imitate different
linguistic conventions. The pictures start to act like words in
a sentence," said Schulz. "I've found that a lot of the structures
of the pictures within these different works actually determine the
meaning of the pictures as much as the representational content that's
within each image."
The opening reception for "Tripteral" will take place on Friday, March
5 ,following Cook's lecture "Memory Denied" in Olin 130 at 5:30 p.m.
Whitman Pioneer
http://whitmanpioneer.com/arts/2010/02/24/ tripteral/
Feb 25 2010
On Tuesday, March 2, "Tripteral: Three Photographic Views" goes up
in the Sheehan Gallery, followed in the next few days by a series
of lectures and workshops related to the exhibits. "Tripteral" is
comprised of three separate exhibits all related to photography.
Tripteral is an architectural term used to describe a building
supported by three columns. Similarly, the exhibits, like columns,
can stand independently but are all related to the same theme.
"All three of the exhibits deal with photography in some way. Each
stands by itself as a separate exhibition but they also function
together," said Dawn Forbes, director of the Sheehan Gallery. "[The
exhibits] support this idea of photography as a generative practice
and a way of processing issues of culture and memory, history and
identity."
The first exhibition is "Memory Denied: The Photography of Kathryn
Cook." Associate Professor of History Elyse Semerdjian, who curates
the exhibition, received funding through the Ashton J. and Virginia
Graham O'Donnell Visiting Professorship in Global Studies Endowment
to bring Cook's photography to Whitman. Cook took the photos, which
document the Armenian genocide trail, while traveling with Semerdjian,
who accompanied her as a translator.
Forbes describes Cook's motivation for documenting the trail as a
desire to preserve and present memories in the face of the Turkish
government's denial.
"There was a genocide that occurred [in Turkey] starting in 1915. [As
with] a lot of genocides . . . governmental regimes have changed,
revisionists have come in, and now there is a denial that this event
ever happened and a lot of the documentation about this genocide has
been destroyed," said Forbes. "So [Cook] traveled the trail following
what documentation remains and took pictures at sites as they exist
in contemporary times, based on records of places where things had
occurred."
The second exhibition, "Resistance and Rescue in Denmark: Photography
by Judy Ellis Glickman," also deals with genocide. Senior history
major Seth Bergeson became aware of the exhibition through the
non-governmental organization Humanity in Action, which focuses on
human and minority rights. In 2008 Bergeson received a fellowship to
work with Humanity in Action, studying human rights and the Holocaust
and conducting research in Washington, D.C. at the Holocaust Memorial
Museum. Bergeson then worked in Denmark, where he found out about
the Glickman exhibition. Originally sponsored by Humanity in Action,
the exhibition is touring over 150 locations in the United States,
France, England, Denmark and Israel. Bergeson then helped bring the
Glickman exhibition to the Sheehan Gallery. Glickman's work captures
the aftermath of Denmark's attempts to save its Jewish citizenry. The
exhibition contains photographic portraits taken of Danish Holocaust
resistors and the people they saved juxtaposed with photographs of
concentration camps in Eastern Europe.
"We sort of have this contrasting of survival and death, and the
difference between what happens when one resists a cultural genocide
and when one participates in it," Forbes said of the exhibit. "It's
very powerful work to have."
Bergeson sees the exhibit as exemplary of Humanity in Action's mission
to work towards social action.
"[Humanity in Action] is ultimately trying to empower people through
these histories [of resistance] to really critically look at history
and how western democracies have allowed these horrendous events to
happen and how we can prevent them in the future," he said.
The third exhibition is "Photo-bookworks," curated by artist David
Schulz, who taught in the fall as a visiting professor from Pratt
Institute's College of Art. The exhibit will feature a number of
artists' photo-bookworks from the Special Collections department in
Penrose Library, as well as selected prints from the books.
"It's really a look at what a photo-bookwork is and how photographic
images can be read, and looking at the way in which that technology
is evolving," explained Forbes. "What we're excited about with his
exhibition is that he's producing a very limited edition artist
photo-book catalog to accompany his curation project."
Schulz's fascination with photo-bookworks started when he was teaching
at Pratt.
"I was teaching photography and graphic design and I started bringing
together examples with specific kinds of visual motifs, like a series
or an index or a narrative or collage. I started to bring together
books to show my students examples of these kinds of motifs, and as I
started bringing together more of these books and sort of refining the
list I also started finding that a lot of these books kind of embodied
visual and verbal experience, not just visual things," he said.
For Schulz, much of the power of the photo-bookworks lies in the
arrangement and composition of the images within the books.
"When you see this kind of repetition it starts to imitate different
linguistic conventions. The pictures start to act like words in
a sentence," said Schulz. "I've found that a lot of the structures
of the pictures within these different works actually determine the
meaning of the pictures as much as the representational content that's
within each image."
The opening reception for "Tripteral" will take place on Friday, March
5 ,following Cook's lecture "Memory Denied" in Olin 130 at 5:30 p.m.