Press RoomNew photography exhibition at Phoenix Art Museum explores street photography and ‘selfie’ phenomenon
New photography exhibition at Phoenix Art Museum explores street photography and ‘selfie’ phenomenon
Jan, 25, 2023
Exhibitions and Special InstallationsPhotography
New photography exhibition at Phoenix Art Museum explores street photography and ‘selfie’ phenomenon
Fashioning Self: The Photography of Everyday Expression spans 1910s to the present; features crowdsourced social-media feed alongside works by David Hume Kennerly, Louis Carlos Bernal, Helen Levitt, Teenie Harris
PHOENIX (January 25, 2023) – This spring, Phoenix Art Museum (PhxArt) presents Fashioning Self: The Photography of Everyday Expression, a new major photography exhibition organized by PhxArt and the Center for Creative Photography (CCP) in Tucson. Spanning the 1910s through the present, Fashioning Self explores the long-intertwined relationship between self-expression, fashion, and the photographic medium, with more than 50 works by Dennis Feldman, Laura Volkerding, Louis Carlos Bernal, Tseng Kwong Chi, David Hume Kennerly, Helen Levitt, Teenie Harris, and others drawn from the CCP collection. These fine-art photographs are displayed alongside a social-media feed of community photos and selfies to spark reflection on the dynamic between photographer and subject, particularly as new technologies, self-styling, and the photographic medium continue to shape visual culture and personal and collective identities around the globe. Fashioning Self: The Photography of Everyday Expression will be on view from March 8 through November 12, 2023 in the Doris and John Norton Gallery for the Center for Creative Photography at Phoenix Art Museum.
“Since the mid-1800s, photographers have captured our world and the captivating cast of characters who inhabit it, documenting all the varied and nuanced presentations of style and expression,” said Jeremy Mikolajczak, the Sybil Harrington Director and CEO of Phoenix Art Museum. “Fashioning Self: The Photography of Everyday Expression sparks fascinating conversations around historical photography genres, including street photography, and how they inform contemporary evolutions, such as selfies and carefully crafted social-media platforms, while also exploring the give-and-take between self-performance and art making.”
Fashioning Self showcases 54 works of street, documentary, and self-portrait photography that present slices of everyday, public life in the United States from 1912 through 2015. Highlighted works in the exhibition include:
A self-portrait by Teenie Harris, the preeminent photographer for The Pittsburgh Courier whose archive of more than 70,000 images created from 1935 to 1975 offers one of the most comprehensive historical records of Black life in the United States.
A portrait titled Albert y Lynn Morales (1987) by Louis Carlos Bernal, one of the earliest Chicano photographers to turn the camera inward on his own community to explore themes of family, home, and religious devotion.
Images by Helen Levitt, a pioneer of 20th-century street photography known for her candid and tender depictions of young people on the streets and sidewalks of her native New York City.
A 1958 portrait of Georgia O’Keeffe and René d’Harnoncourt, then-director of the Museum of Modern Art, New York, created by Rollie McKenna, who was known for her portraits of literary figures and artists.
Intimate works by David Hume Kennerly, one of the youngest recipients of the Pulitzer Prize in Journalism who is renowned for his images of political life and world events, including the Vietnam War.
Other featured works include those by Garry Winograd, Marion Post Wolcott, Kozo Miyoshi, Laura Volkerding, Tseng Kwong Chi, Joan Liftin, and Rosalind Solomon, among others.
The exhibition’s fine-art images are complemented by a rotating display of social-media photos reflecting community members and individuals from across the United States. Throughout the duration of the exhibition, the Museum and CCP will invite visitors, Arizona residents, and the institutions’ collective social-media followings to snap their own selfies and portraits in the galleries or other environments and share them via the hashtag #FashioningSelf for display in Norton Gallery. By placing these contemporary, real-time images in conversation with works by renowned photographers of the Americas, the exhibition interrogates what it means to be an artist or maker when cameras are commonplace and everyone curates a feed.
“I am excited for visitors to contribute their own photos to Fashioning Self and engage with works from CCP’s collection in a fun and unique way,” said Rebecca A. Senf, chief curator at CCP and curator of Fashioning Self. “By participating in the gallery’s regularly updated social-media feed, they will be included in a century-long history of photographers who have fashioned, captured, and distributed visual representations of identity, while considering how technology, digital platforms, and the ubiquity of the camera continue to shape our understandings of self and each other.”
About the Exhibition Fashioning Self: The Photography of Everyday Expressionis organized by Phoenix Art Museum and the Center for Creative Photography. It is made possible through the generosity of the Museum’s Circles of Support and Museum Members. For more details about the exhibition, please click here.
Admission is free for Museum Members; veterans, active-duty military, and their immediate families; youth aged 5 and younger; and Maricopa County Community Colleges students with an active ID. Entrance into the exhibition is included in general admission for the public. During voluntary-donation times, the exhibition is offered to the public included with voluntary “pay-what-you-wish” admission. Voluntary-donation times include Wednesdays from 3 – 9 pm. For a full breakdown of general-admission prices and hours, see phxart.org/visit/.
High-resolution photography can be downloaded here. To request interviews, contact the Communications Office of Phoenix Art Museum at 602.257.2117 or samantha.santos@phxart.org.
About Phoenix Art Museum Since 1959, Phoenix Art Museum has provided millions of guests with access to world-class art and experiences in an effort to ignite imaginations, create meaningful connections, and serve as a brave space for all people who wish to experience the transformative power of art. Located in Phoenix’s Central Corridor, the Museum is a vibrant destination for the visual arts and the largest art museum in the southwestern United States. Each year, more than 300,000 guests engage with critically acclaimed national and international exhibitions and the Museum’s collection of more than 20,000 works of American and Western American, Asian, European, Latin American, modern and contemporary art, and fashion design. The Museum also presents a comprehensive film program, live performances, and educational programs designed for visitors of all ages, along with vibrant photography exhibitions made possible through the Museum’s landmark partnership with the Center for Creative Photography, University of Arizona. To learn more about Phoenix Art Museum, visit phxart.org, or call 602.257.1880.
About the Center for Creative Photography The Center for Creative Photography at the University of Arizona, in Tucson, is recognized as one of the world’s finest academic art museums and study centers for the history of photography. The Center opened in 1975, following a meeting between then University President Dr. John Schaefer and world-renowned photographer Ansel Adams. Beginning with the archives of five living master photographers—Ansel Adams, Wynn Bullock, Harry Callahan, Aaron Siskind, and Frederick Sommer—the collection has grown to include 270 archival collections. Among these are some of the most recognizable names in 20th-century North American photography: Lola Álvarez Bravo, W. Eugene Smith, Edward Weston, and Garry Winogrand. Altogether, there are over eight million archival objects in the Center’s collection including negatives, work prints, contact sheets, albums, scrapbooks, correspondence, writings, audiovisual materials and memorabilia. In addition to whole archival collections, the Center also actively acquires individual photographs by modern and contemporary photographers. There are currently more than 110,000 works by over 2,200 photographers. A library of books, journals, and exhibition and auction catalogues, including many rare publications, plus an extensive oral history collection complements the archival and fine print collections. The combined art, archival, and research collections at the Center provide an unparalleled resource for research, exhibitions, loans, and traveling exhibitions. The Center has a full schedule of exhibitions, programs, and events designed to deepen an understanding of how the medium impacts society. For more details, as well as information on Center membership and ways to get involved, visit ccp.arizona.edu.
