Margaret Bourke-White: Pioneering Photojournalist

Via Photograph Magazine

Margaret Bourke-White: Pioneering Photojournalist

Monroe Gallery of Photography, Santa Fe

Margaret Bourke-White, Buchenwald Prisoners, 1945. Courtesy Monroe Gallery of Photography ©Time In.

Referring to the French Impressionist painter Claude Monet, fellow painter Paul Cézanne famously quipped to art dealer Ambroise Vollard: “Monet is only an eye, but my God what an eye!” The same could be said for American photographer Margaret Bourke-White (1904-1971). Examining Bourke-White’s work, from the late 1920s through the 1950s, one quickly senses her complete command of the photographic tools at her disposal that resulted in compositions filled with formal elements of design that were part and parcel of narratives that documented times of significant events. Soaring heights of urban construction, extreme poverty in the South, and World War II are only a few of the historic moments captured in photographs by Bourke-White – many of which are iconic in American photography.

In 50 photographs on view at Monroe Gallery of Photography through June 28, Margaret Bourke-White: Pioneering Photojournalist gives a brief, yet fine overview of her prolific career.

 

Margaret Bourke-White, Fort Peck Dam, Fort Peck, MT, 1936. Courtesy Monroe Gallery of Photography  ©Time Inc

 

Included are instantly recognizable images such as At the Time of the Louisville Flood, Louisville, Kentucky, 1937, where people are queued in a bread line below a billboard exuding the good life, as well as Buchenwald Prisoners, Germany, 1945, in which prisoners confined behind barbed-wire await liberation -- the latter taken when Bourke-White was on assignment for Life Magazine traveling with Patton’s army. In one of her most artistic images, Patterns Made by Steel Liners for Diversion Tunnels, Fort Peck Dam, Montana, 1936, geometric patterns fill the frame composed of various machine-hewed disks with radiating spokes. Bourke-White, whose career was cut short by Parkinson’s disease in 1956, once said, “To understand another human being you must gain insight into the conditions which made him what he is.” She was tenacious in her pursuit of photographs that conveyed truths about the human condition, as well as the beauty in things produced by humankind. 

 

 

— By Douglas Fairfield  05/04/2015

World Press Freedom Day May 3

World Press Freedom Day is Sunday, May 3. Join us in remembering journalists who have died while bearing witness. Change your social profile picture to our black press ribbon and post your support using ‪#‎remembering‬ on May 3 between 6 and 9 p.m. (local time).

Learn more at rememberingfallenjournalists.com.

United Nations:  World Press Freedom Day 

UNESCO: World Press Freedom Day

Manifest Exhibit: Manifest Justice May 1 - 10

 

 

Via Manifest Justice

 

Join us for a large-scale pop-up art exhibition, cultural convening, and community organizing event. Together, we will lift our voices, assert our power and identify solutions to build healthy and safe communities worldwide.

 

Calendar of Events

 

(310) 779-6090

info@manifestjustice.org

http://www.manifestjustice.org/




LA Times:  150 artists and a Ferguson, Mo., police car at political pop-up 'Manifest Justice'

  

Monroe Gallery of Photography is honored to present a very special collection of Civil Rights photographs at the Manifest Justice exhibit in Los Angles May 1 - 10.

 

 

Trailblazer: Monroe Gallery tips artistic hat to Margaret Bourke-White

©Time Inc. Courtesy Monroe Gallery

Via The Santa Fe Reporter

April 22, 2015

By Enrique Limón

As a symbol for globetrotting photojournalism, Margaret Bourke-White’s brand in the field is still felt today. Born on June 14, 1904, in New York City, she soon would become a beacon for editorial photography, focusing on subjects both live and inanimate, and securing the first cover image for LIFE magazine—an iconic study of the dams in the Columbia River basin.


“There is so much to talk about Margaret Bourke-White,” Monroe Gallery of Photography’s Michelle Monroe muses. “Her vision directed LIFE. It was her global look at why things mattered; why the Russian Revolution was going to affect ours; why man’s industry and this sort of race toward that conclusion mattered; why humans in India who were trying to gain independence from Britain mattered to America. It was a really sophisticated worldview for that time.”

Monroe continues, “America was largely illiterate in 1936, and this woman met [LIFE editor] Henry Luce and was the first person hired for his magazine, which is also extraordinary—because she’s a girl,” she says, with a playfully scandalized tone.
The Don Gaspar gallery showcases 54 of Bourke-White’s emblematic images, starting this Friday and going through June 28.

Before her death of Parkinson’s disease in 1971, Bourke-White managed to stamp her unique perspective on historic events like Gandhi’s release from prison in 1946, the ripple of the South African labor exploitation during the 1950s and the liberation of German concentration camps by General Patton.

The breadth of Bourke-White’s oeuvre as well as her approach, Monroe stresses, far surpasses whatever labels one might want to stick on her based on gender.

“I try not to talk about ‘female artists’ or ‘female gallerists’ because that puts us in a kind of margin,” Monroe says. “You have to think that in 1936, it was extraordinary that this woman was hired as the first journalist in what would become Henry Luce’s magnum opus.”

Margaret Bourke-White
5-7 pm Friday, April 24
Monroe Gallery of Photography
112 Don Gaspar Ave., 

505 992 0800

AIPAD Photography Show 2015 Recap

"Monroe Gallery of Photography (here): Classics of photojournalism often quickly jump into the realm of fine art, and this recent image by Whitney Curtis from the Ferguson protests is memorably symbolic. It’s a modern version of Goya, with the compositional opposition of the hands up and the over-the-top riot gear. Priced at $2500"


Via Collector Daily


Every Booth at the 2015 AIPAD Photography Show New York, Part 1 of 4


Every Booth at the 2015 AIPAD Photography Show New York, Part 2 of 4
Every Booth at the 2015 AIPAD Photography Show New York, Part 3 of 4
Every Booth at the 2015 AIPAD Photography Show New York, Part 4 of 4






Via BWGallerist


On Site: The Best of AIPAD 2015, Park Avenue Armory


Via L'Oeil de la Photographie


AIPAD 2015 : Monroe Gallery of Photography

THAT'S ME IN THE PICTURE

Stanley Forman: "The Soiling of Old Glory", 1976

That’s me in the picture: Ted Landsmark is assaulted in Boston, at an ‘anti-bussing’ protest, 5 April 1976 via The Guardian


View this photograph at the AIPAD Photography Show, Monroe gallery of Photography, Booth #119, April 15 - 19 2015

"38 years ago today I won my second Pulitzer. I recently found this clip (I have lots of clips but where they are nobody knows, including me). With the help of my friend Scott Ryder we copied a lot of stuff lately.

It was Marathon Day, April 18, 1977. The Marathon back then began at noon. I raced (by car) back to the finish line at the Prudential Building after covering the start in Hopkinton. The winners would start showing up around 2:10.

The Pulitzers were historically announced the first Monday in May so I had no clue why I was summoned back to the office immediately. It was a very exciting day."  --Stanley Forman

The Eye of Photography: Monroe Gallery at AIPAD 2015

Via L'Oeil de la Photographie








AIPAD 2015 : Monroe Gallery of Photography

Rashaad Davis, 23, backs away as St. Louis County police officers approach him with guns drawn and eventually arrest him, Ferguson, Missouri, August 11, 2014 c Whitney Curtis

Monroe Gallery of Photography specializes in classic black-and-white photography with an emphasis on humanist and photojournalist imagery. The gallery features work by more than 75 renowned photographers and also represents a select group of contemporary photographers. The gallery (booth #119) is exhibiting a specially curated collection of civil rights photographs at the AIPAD Photography Show 2015. Featured will be a variety of images from the history of civil rights, with prints including the 1965 Selma March to the recent protests in Ferguson, Missouri.

Of particular note are two prints by Whitney Curtis, photographed during the unrest in Ferguson, Missouri. One print titled "Rashaad Davis, 23, backs away as St. Louis County police officers approach him with guns drawn and eventually arrest him, Ferguson, Missouri, August 11, 2014" was published extensively in national newspapers and just was awarded First Place in Domestic News by the National Press Photographer's Association in the Best Photojournalism of 2015 Awards. Monroe Gallery of Photography is proud to debut Curtis' photography at the AIPAD Photography Show

Monroe Gallery's booth is also exhibiting the environmental documentary photography of Stephen Wilkes, specifically images from Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy; and one from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Of particular note is a large format (50 x 66") color print of a television set washed up on the beach of Bay St. Louis, Mississippi after Hurricane Katrina that is visually arresting.

Monroe Gallery of Photography was founded by Sidney S. Monroe and Michelle A. Monroe. Building on more than four decades of collective experience, the gallery specializes in 20th and 21st Century Photojournalism.


1. Stephen Wilkes
Hurricane Katrina: TV in Sand, Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, June 12, 2006
Digital c-print, 50 x 66 inches, edition 2 of 8

2. Whitney Curtis
Rashaad Davis, 23, backs away as St. Louis County police officers approach him with guns drawn and eventually arrest him, Ferguson, Missouri, August 11, 2014

3. Whitney Curtis
A man raises his hands in front of a row of St. Louis County police armored personnel carriers, Ferguson, Missouri, Aug. 11, 2014
Archival pigment prints, 18 x 26 inches, edition 1/10

April 5, 1976: "The Soiling of Old Glory"

Stanly Forman: The Soiling of Old Glory

April 5, 1976

Via Today in History


In 1976, during an outdoor demonstration against court-ordered school busing in Boston, a white teenager swung a pole holding an American flag at a black attorney  in a scene captured in a Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph by Stanley Forman of the Boston Herald American.


Monroe Gallery of Photography will be exhibiting this photograph at the AIPAD Photography Show in New York April 16 - 19, 2015, in booth #119.

The photograph depicts a white teenager, Joseph Rakes, about to assault black lawyer and civil-rights activist Ted Landsmark with a flagpole bearing the American flag. It was taken in Boston on April 5, 1976, during a protest against court-ordered desegregation busing. It ran on the front page of the Herald American the next day, and also appeared in several newspapers across the country. It won the 1977 Pulitzer Prize for Spot Photography. "Louis Masur has written an indispensable history about an unforgettable image. With admirable empathy and grace, he reveals why racial conflict in modern America is both so compelling and so difficult to resolve."

Photojournalist Whitney Curtis awarded First Place in 2014 Domestic News by NPPA

The National Press Photographers Association's Best Of Photojournalism 2015 awards were announced on Tuesday, March 31.

© Whitney Curtis

Rashaad Davis, 23, backs away slowly as St. Louis County police officers approach him with guns drawn and eventually arrest him on Monday, Aug. 11, 2014, at the corner of Canfield Drive and West Flroissant Avenue in Ferguson, Mo. Members of the community took to the streets to protest the fatal police shooting of Michael Brown by police officer Darren Wilson.

In Domestic News,  first place was awarded to Whitney Curtis of The New York Times. Whitney Curtis is now represented by Monroe Gallery of Photography, and several of her momentous images from Ferguson, Missouri will be exhibited during the AIPAD Photography Show April 16 - 19 (Booth #119, Monroe Gallery of Photography). The Gallery will be exhibiting a specially curated collection of Civil Rights photographs from the 1965 Selma march to the present day.

Curtis' photographs will also be featured in the exhibition "Civil Rights from Sema to Ferguson" at Monroe Gallery of Photography July 3 - September 20, 2015.

About Whitney Curtis

Photos that raise awareness, reveal truth, and ask us to pause. Reflect. Photojournalism is how Whitney Curtis tells stories we might have never known otherwise.

As an editorial, corporate, and commercial photographer, Whitney’s goal is simple: show respect to the subject-matter by creating intimate, creative images that illustrate the story.

After graduating with a degree in photojournalism from the University of Missouri-Columbia, Whitney worked as a staff photojournalist at The Kansas City Star, northern Utah’s Standard-Examiner, and the Daily Herald in suburban Chicago. As an editorial photojournalist, Whitney’s work has been honored by The Associated Press, NPPA’s Best of Photojournalism, CPoY, and Women in Photojournalism.

Exhibition of new photography acquisitions opens at the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum

Alfred Stieglitz, the avant-garde photographer and gallerist who later became her husband, created a series of more than 300 photographs of O’Keeffe during the course of his life.

Via ArtDaily.com

SANTA FE, NM.- “New Photography Acquisitions” opened at the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum March 27, 2015. This exhibition presents a selection of the newest additions to the Museum’s photography collection, many of which have never been published or exhibited at the Museum.

“We are especially proud to offer the first look at these recent acquisitions, including photographs that span O’Keeffe’s life from New York to New Mexico,” says Robert A. Kret, director of the Georgia O’Keeffe Museum. ”New Photography Acquisitions" includes many rarely seen images of O’Keeffe, one of the most photographed women of the 20th century, by some of the most well-known photographers of her day.”

“It is wonderful to see these insightful images,” says Carolyn Kastner, curator of the exhibition, “which include beautiful gelatin silver prints from Alfred Stieglitz, Philippe Halsman, and Ansel Adams, whose mastery of their media is a great complement to O’Keeffe’s paintings.”

Alfred Stieglitz, the avant-garde photographer and gallerist who later became her husband, created a series of more than 300 photographs of O’Keeffe during the course of his life, beginning in 1917. Several images from 1918, are included in the exhibition. One is famous for picturing O’Keeffe in the act of painting (one of only two known to do so), while others, which have not previously been published, frame intimate moments at Lake George, where the couple spent the summer and fall at the Stieglitz family home.

After Stieglitz’s death and O’Keeffe’s move to the remote village of Abiquiu in New Mexico, the artist continued to be a subject of interest to important photographers of the day, who journeyed to New Mexico and captured the artist in her environment, at home and in the landscape. Important portrait photographers such as Philippe Halsman, Yousuf Karsh, John Loengard, Arnold Newman and Tony Vaccaro followed her west. O’Keeffe friends Ansel Adams and Todd Webb, famous for their landscape photography, composed portraits of the artist–working the stark New Mexico scenery into the frame. Later pictures by Doris Bry, George Daniell, and Arnold Newman portray O’Keeffe in her New Mexico homes and in the surrounding landscape.

The Georgia O’Keeffe Museum’s photographic archive numbers more than 2,000 images. It forms a valuable record of the many ways that O’Keeffe presented herself to the camera in formal portraits as well as in candid snapshots with friends and family. Since the Museum was founded in 1997, its collection of photographs has grown steadily, primarily through gifts. The largest gift of more than 1000 photographs was presented to the Museum in 2006 by the Georgia O’Keeffe Foundation. That collection, assembled by the artist during her long life, became part of her estate after her death in 1986.

Similarly, the new acquisitions included in this exhibition, part of a collection purchased by the Museum in 2014, are unique because O’Keeffe selected the photographs for James Johnson Sweeney, the curator of her 1946 retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art. The acquisitions include a wide range of materials such as fine art prints, copy prints, negatives, contact sheets, and documentary photographs.

The Museum’s photographic archive also constitutes a collection of work by contemporaries of O’Keeffe who were recognized photographers in their own right as well as friends and visitors to New Mexico. The creative practice of O’Keeffe, her husband Alfred Stieglitz, and the photographers in the Museum’s collection span the 20th century and the rise of American Modernism. “New Photography Acquisitions” will be on view March 27 – September 26, 2015

RELATED: The Wall Street Journal: "Santa Fe is an unlikely center of photography"