Tony Vaccaro on VE Day - 'We Just Did Our Bit:' WWII Vets Recall War 75 Years Later

Photo by Maria Vaccaro

Via the New York Times
May 8, 2020

LONDON — Seventy-five years after World War II ended in Europe,
The Associated Press spoke to veterans who endured mortal danger,
oppression and fear. As they mark Victory in Europe Day on
 Friday, they also are dealing with loneliness brought on by the
coronavirus pandemic. Here is some of their testimony.

SURVIVING NORMANDY AND COVID-19

Tony Vaccaro is one of the few people alive who can claim to
 have survived the Battle of Normandy and COVID-19.

He was dealt a bad hand early, as his mother died during
childbirth a few years before tuberculosis claimed his father.
 By age 5, he was an orphan in Italy, enduring beatings from
an uncle. By World War II he was an American G.I.

Now, at age 97, he is recovering from COVID-19. He attributes
his longevity to “blind luck, red wine” and determination.

To me, the greatest thing that you can do is challenge the world,”
 he said. “And most of these challenges I win. That’s what keeps
me going.”

Vaccaro’s grit carried him into a lifetime of photography that
began as a combat infantryman when he stowed a camera and
captured close to 8,000 photographs.

One of his famous images,
“Kiss of Liberation,” showed a U.S. sergeant kissing a French 
girl at the end of Nazi occupation.

Vaccaro documented the reconstruction of Europe and
returned to the U.S. where he worked for magazines
such as Look and Life and has fond memories of
photographing celebrities including Sophia Loren, J
ohn. F. Kennedy, Georgia O’Keefe and Pablo Picasso.

Vaccaro lives in Queens, the New York City borough ravaged
by the coronavirus, and next to his family.

He might have caught the virus in April from his son or in
their neighborhood, his daughter-in-law Maria said. He was in
the hospital two days and spent another week recovering.

“That was it,” she said. “He’s walking around like nothing happened.”

Current Exhibition On-Line: LIFE: Defining Photography

We are unable to present our scheduled exhibitions in person. In this difficult time of social distancing, as a very small measure, we hope viewing our exhibits, current and past, on our website brings you enjoyment




The Albuquerque Journal
April 26, 2020


Life through the lens: Online exhibition showcases iconic imagery from the acclaimed magazine

"Mickey Mantle Having a Bad Day at Yankee Stadium, New York, 1965” by John Dominis/Life Picture Collection (Courtesy of Monroe Gallery)

Santa Fe’s Monroe Gallery of Photography is affirming that legacy while giving a nod to social distancing with the online exhibition “Life: Defining Photography” on view at monroegallery.com.

The Santa Fe New Mexican

Pasatiempo

May 1, 2020

LIFE at Monroe Gallery of Photography

The exhibition LIFE: Defining Photography includes work by Bill Ray, Alfred Eisenstaedt, and Margaret Bourke-White.

Bill Ray, Marilyn Monroe singing “Happy Birthday” to President John F. Kennedy, Madison Square Garden, New York, May 19, 1962 (1962), gelatin silver print

Send your greeting to Tony Vaccaro

UPDATE April 26, 2020 - Tony has recovered fromCovid-19 and is doing well, Thank you for your kind messages that helped Tony through his illness!

Tony Vaccaro survived World War II, fighting the enemy while also documenting his experience at great risk. After the war, Tony went on to become one the most sought after photographers of his day.  In recent years there has been a career renaissance for Tony with exhibits world-wide.  In addition to his beautiful family Tony’s great love has been meeting and sharing his work with you.

Having been isolated from both family and friends for his safety during the Covid-19 crisis, Tony’s spirit is suffering. Please take a moment to record a message or short video for Tony to let him know that he is important to you.

Send it to us and we will forward to our dear friend Tony:

by email

Card or letter: c/o Monroe Gallery of Photography, 112 Don Gaspar Ave, Santa Fe, NM 87501

Thank you.

Announcing Our YouTube Channel

We are pleased to announce our YouTube Channel. Watch for new videos in the coming days and weeks.

As a very small measure, we hope viewing our videos brings you enjoyment during this difficult time. You may also view our exhibits, current and past, on our website.

STANDING ROCK SIOUX TRIBE PREVAILS AS FEDERAL JUDGE STRIKES DOWN DAPL PERMITS

Ryan Vizzions: Protesters face off with police and the National Guard on February 1, 2017, 

near Cannon Ball, North Dakota.

Via Earth Justice

MARCH 25, 2020

Washington, D.C. — A federal court today granted a request by the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe to strike down federal permits for the controversial Dakota Access Pipeline.

The Court found the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers violated the National Environmental Policy Act when it affirmed federal permits for the pipeline originally issued in 2016. Specifically, the Court found significant unresolved concerns about the potential impacts of oil spills and the likelihood that one could take place.

For example, the Court criticized the Corps for failing to address the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe’s expert criticism of its analysis, citing issues like potential worst case discharge, the difficulty of detecting slow leaks, and responding to spills in winter. Similarly, the Court observed that DAPL’s parent company’s abysmal safety record “does not inspire confidence,” finding that it should have been considered more closely.

The Court ordered the Corps to prepare a full environmental impact statement on the pipeline, something that the Tribe has sought from the beginning of this controversy. The Court asked the parties to submit additional briefing on the question of whether to shut down the pipeline in the interim.

“After years of commitment to defending our water and earth, we welcome this news of a significant legal win,” said Standing Rock Sioux Tribe Chairman Mike Faith. “It’s humbling to see how actions we took four years ago to defend our ancestral homeland continue to inspire national conversations about how our choices ultimately affect this planet. Perhaps in the wake of this court ruling the federal government will begin to catch on, too, starting by actually listening to us when we voice our concerns.”

“This validates everything the Tribe has been saying all along about the risk of oil spills to the people of Standing Rock,” said Earthjustice attorney Jan Hasselman. “The Obama administration had it right when it moved to deny the permits in 2016, and this is the second time the Court has ruled that the government ran afoul of environmental laws when it permitted this pipeline. We will continue to see this through until DAPL has finally been shut down.”

BACKGROUND
In December of 2016, the Obama administration denied permits for DAPL to cross the Missouri River, and ordered a full environmental impact statement to analyze alternative pipeline routes and impacts on the Tribe’s treaty rights. Yet on his second day in office, Trump reversed that order, directing that permits be issued. Pipeline construction was completed by June of 2017.

The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe challenged the permits in court and won. The Court ruled then that the environmental analysis had been insufficient because it failed to account for consequences facing the Tribe, and ordered the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to redo it. However, the judge declined to shut down the pipeline in the interim.

The Army Corps then redid its environmental analysis, but essentially shut the Tribe out of the review process, and concluded that its previous analysis had been sufficient and that nothing needed to change. In response, Earthjustice and the Tribe went back to court. In a motion for summary judgment filed last August, the Tribe asked the Court to shut down the pipeline and order the Corps to conduct a full environmental analysis.

The massive 2016 gathering of Tribes and allies defending Standing Rock Sioux territory from DAPL captured the world’s attention and attracted international media coverage. It helped give rise to a global movement of indigenous resistance to fossil-fuel infrastructure projects.

UPDATED : Monroe Gallery Temporarily Closed

May 18 - 2020
The Gallery has reopened with modified Covid-19 Safety precautions

March 18, 2020

The health and safety of our community, patrons, and colleagues is of the utmost importance to us and in light of the New Mexico state government’s public health guidance, and to be responsible to our community by preventing unnecessary spread of Covid-19, the Gallery is currently closed. We are working remotely and are available by email and appointment.

Thank you for your understanding and support in these difficult times.

Updated information will be posted here and on our social media feeds.

Thank you.

Sid and Michelle Monroe

info@monroegallery.com

www.monroegallery.com

Monroe Gallery on Paris Photo New York Fair Postponement and COVID-19

March 11,2020


Today Paris Photo New York released the following statement concerning the scheduled first edition of the fair April 1-5, 2020:

"Paris, 10 March 2020 – After careful consideration and comprehensive discussions with galleries and partners, the inaugural edition of Paris Photo New York, organized by Reed Expositions France, will be postponed to a later date due to the growing concerns over public health and safety and the developing COVID-19 situation. A new date will be announced as soon as possible.  

Reed Expositions France, the Show Management of Paris Photo New York, together with AIPAD, Show Committee members, and the Selection Committee made the difficult decision in consultation with all stakeholders and in alignment with the advice from the US public health authorities regarding travel to and from impacted countries.  The Show Management takes the concerns of its exhibitors and supporters seriously and is convinced that the postponement is in the best interest of galleries, collectors and art enthusiasts alike.

Michel Filzi, President of Reed Expositions France, said: “With 178 exhibitors confirmed, this first edition has had an overwhelming welcome from the photo art galleries and editors. We were all very excited to launch this first edition of Paris Photo New York in March, and to build another bridge in the art scene between our two continents. However, the health and well-being of exhibitors, visitors, sponsors, media representatives, cultural institutions and our employees from around the globe is and will always be our first priority. We have therefore made the decision to postpone the Paris Photo New York event to a later date.”

“We fully understand and appreciate the level of planning that is required to participate in an event like ours.  Reed Expositions France will therefore be doing our utmost to help all our customers and their partners to prepare for the upcoming edition. On behalf of all of the Reed Exhibition teams, we truly thank all those involved for their trust, their hard work to date as well as their continued encouragement and support during this challenging time,” said Michel Filzi."

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The health and safety of our community, patrons, and colleagues is of the utmost importance to us. Amid growing travel concerns surrounding COVID-19, we want to assure you we are taking preventive measures to keep our gallery safe and maintain a healthy environment. We are currently attempting to maintain normal business hours but recommend calling for the latest information. 

We are continuously making decisions on how the latest health mandates impact our daily operations. For the most up-to-date information on our exhibits and events, visit our website www.monroegallery.com

International Acclaim For the Exhibition "Ida Wyman: Life with a camera"

Ida Wyman: Man looking in wastebasket, Coney Island, New York, 1945

Today, March 7, would have been Ida Wyman's 94th birthday. The daughter of Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe, Ida Wyman was born March 7, 1926 in Malden, Massachusetts. The family soon moved to New York, where her parents ran a small grocery store in the Bronx. Her parents bought her a box camera when she was 14, and she joined the camera club at Walton High School, honing her skills at taking and printing pictures. By the time Wyman was 16, she know that she wanted to work as a photographer.

Opportunities then were few for women photographers, but in 1943 Wyman joined Acme Newspictures as a mail room ‘boy’; pulling prints and captioning them for clients.

When the war ended, Acme's only female printer was fired so a man could have her job. Wyman set out on her own to begin free-lance work for magazines, and her first photo story was published in LOOK magazine the same year. By 1948 she was in Los Angeles, working on assignments for LIFE magazine. She would eventually cover over 100 assignments for LIFE.

For the next several years, Wyman covered assignments for LIFE, Fortune, Saturday Evening Post, Parade, and many other leading publications of the time. Ida Wyman passed away in July, 2019. Although not as famous as some of her contemporaries, Ida was one of the defining artists of early street photography that helped shape how we look at our world.

HUCK Magazine

The unsung photographer of the 20th century: Celebrating Ida Wyman

The Daily Mail

The best photographer you never heard of: Ida Wyman captured 1950s American street life, Hollywood glamour and the euphoria of the Allied victory over Japan - now it's all rolled into one glorious exhibition

Ida Wyman: Life with a camera continues through April 19, and selection from the exhibit will be on view in our booth #A1 during Paris Photo New York Presented by AIPAD at Pier 94 in New York, April 2-5.

Exhibition examines Life Magazine's innovative role in shaping 20th-century photography

Via ArtDaily

Robert Capa, Hungarian, 1913–1954, Normandy Invasion on D-Day, Soldier Advancing through Surf,  1944. Gelatin silver print. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, The Howard Greenberg Collection—Museum purchase with funds donated by the Phillip Leonian and Edith Rosenbaum Leonian Charitable Trust. Robert Capa © International Center of Photography. Photograph Courtesy Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

PRINCETON, NJ.- From its groundbreaking launch issue in 1936 through the conclusion of its weekly run in 1972, Life magazine profoundly shaped how its readers viewed themselves – and the world. Life also had a transformative impact on the development of modern photography and on the artists and photojournalists who have employed the medium to tell their (and our) stories ever since. Drawing on unprecedented access to Life magazine’s picture and paper archives, Life Magazine and the Power of Photography features more than 150 objects, including an array of archival materials such as caption files, contact sheets and shooting scripts to provide new insights on the collaborative processes behind the magazine’s now-iconic images and photo essays. Unlike previous projects that have celebrated Life’s imagery and photographers, this exhibition and its extensive publication attempts something entirely different: an exploration of how Life’s contributors and staff championed and influenced photography through sophisticated visual storytelling.

Life Magazine and the Power of Photography is co-curated by Katherine A. Bussard, Peter C. Bunnell curator of photography at the Princeton University Art Museum; Kristen Gresh, Estrellita and Yousuf Karsh senior curator of photographs at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston; and Alissa Schapiro, Ph.D. candidate in art history at Northwestern University. It premiered in Princeton Feb. 22-June 21, 2020, before traveling to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Aug. 19-Dec. 13, 2020.

The organizers are the first museums to be granted complete access to the Life Picture Collection and among the first to delve deeply into the newly available Time Inc. Records Archive at the New-York Historical Society.

“The global reach, connective storytelling and visionary photo-essays of Life magazine substantially reshaped how Americans understood the role of photography in the 20th century,” notes James Steward, Nancy A. Nasher–David J. Haemisegger, Class of 1976, director, “and we are delighted to bring this to life through this exhibition.”

From the period of the Great Depression to the Vietnam War, the vast majority of the photographs printed and viewed in the United States appeared on the pages of illustrated magazines, including the photography showcased in Life magazine. During its 36-year run as a weekly (1936-72), Life became one of the most widely read and influential magazines of all time. At the height of its circulation, the magazine boasted 8.5 million weekly subscribers, and consistently reached approximately 25 percent of Americans. In the words of Life’s founder, Henry R. Luce, Life proposed “to scour the world for the best pictures of every kind; to edit them with a feeling for visual form, for history and for drama; and to publish them on fine paper, every week, for a dime.”

The work of photographers such as Margaret Bourke-White, Larry Burrows, Robert Capa, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Alfred Eisenstaedt, Charles Moore, Gordon Parks and W. Eugene Smith will be explored in the exhibition in the context of the magazine’s complex and highly collaborative creative and editorial processes. In addition, the exhibition explores the ways in which Life promoted a predominately white, middle-class perspective on politics and culture that reinforced the geopolitical prominence of the United States.

The accompanying 336-page catalogue, published by the Princeton University Art Museum and distributed by Yale University Press, examines Life’s groundbreaking role in mid-20th-century American culture and the history of photography by considering the complexity of the magazine’s image-making and publishing enterprise. The book includes essays and contributions by the curators and 22 additional scholars of art history, American studies, history and communication studies. 

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Monroe Gallery was pleased to contribute several prints to the exhibitions, and will feature its own exhibition of LIFE magazine photographers April 24 - June 21, 2020

Ida Wyman at Monroe Gallery of Photography

The Santa Fe New Mexican
Friday, February 14, 2020

       Ida Wyman, Boy with Inner Tube, Santa Monica, California (1949), gelatin silver print



Monroe Gallery of Photography, 112 Don Gaspar Ave., 505-992-0800, monroegallery.com


Although her evocative images of everyday life have graced the pages of magazines such as Life, Business Week, Parade, and Fortune, Ida Wyman never achieved the fame afforded to her contemporaries. Now recognized for the quality of her street art, Wyman, who died in July, gets the recognition she deserves with her first posthumous retrospective at Monroe. The daughter of Jewish immigrants, she grew up in Massachusetts and New York and, at 16, was determined to become a photographer. At a time when there were few opportunities for female photographers in the United States, Wyman worked as a freelancer, garnering hundreds of assignments. Her work is known for its humanism and slice-of-life depictions of America at mid-century. The show, Ida Wyman: Life with a Camera, opens with a 5 p.m. reception on Friday, Feb. 14 (through April 12).