Rita Bernstein: Out of Place

Please join us Saturday, June 2, from 6 – 8 p.m. for the opening of Rita Bernstein: Out of Place. The exhibition will run through Saturday, September 1, 2012. The artist will be in attendance for the opening reception.

Journey: mixed media (photograph on handmade paper with beeswax and oil paint) 9 x 9 inches, Ed. of 5

 

Rita Bernstein began photographing after working nearly two decades as a civil rights lawyer, eschewing her legal career in favor of time with her two children. As such, her work explores the sorrows and sweetness of family life and, more generally, the ambivalence that shadows intimate relationships. Though her subjects tend to be younger individuals, Bernstein’s intent is not specifically to examine childhood. Rather, it is the uninhibited behavior of children that reveals, in a broader sense, the complexities of the human psyche.

Charmaine: hand applied silver emulsion on Japanese gampi, 10 x 11.5 inches, Ed. of 15

 

As a self-professed “reluctant traveler,” Bernstein shoots most of her photographs close to her Philadelphia home or near her family’s summer cottage in the northern stretches of Pennsylvania. In difference to staged photography she chooses to work intuitively, discovering rather than orchestrating her compositions. While some of her subjects are strangers, she prefers shooting those whom she knows well, resulting in works of increased intimacy, honesty and subtlety.

Lake Swim (hand applied silver emulsion on Japanese gampi, 10 x 10 inches, Ed of 15)

 

Bernstein’s work has received notable international acclaim, having been featured in publications ranging from LensWork to B + W Magazine (UK) to The Philadelphia Inquirer. In addition to print features, her photographs can be found in collections at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts and the Johnson and Johnson World Headquarters Corporate Collection, among others.

Still Lives: mixed media (photograph on handmade paper with beeswax and oil paint) 9 x 9 inches, Ed. of 5

 

For the complete catalogue of Out of Place, please visit our exhibition page here.

A Photographic Mother's Day

 

A Happy Mother's Day to all of our blog readers out there!  In celebration, enjoy a selection of appropriately themed photographs … and then call your mother!

Elliot Erwitt: Mother and Child, New York City

 

Ida Wyman: Mama, Papa, Billy

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Edward Steichen: Mother and Child – Sunlight

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Dorothea Lange: Migrant Mother

 

Gordon Parks: Mother and Child, Harlem

 

Martin Elkhort: Where's Momma

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Ruth Orkin: Mother and Baby

 

Rita Bernstein: Expecting

 

Happy Mother's Day!

Susan Burnstine featured in the San Francisco Weekly

 

This week's Arts section of the San Francisco Weekly has a wonderful review of the work of Susan Burnstine, whose photographs were featured here at the John Cleary Gallery in her Within Shadows exhibition this past Fall.

The Last Goodbye

Author Jonathan Curiel writes:

"Burnstine uses special homemade cameras, with odd lenses and other makeshift parts, to distort her photos at the point of conception. Her images almost seem like mirages. Edges are blurred or out of focus, and the photos' central subjects — whether buildings, vistas, corridors or people — are also bathed in translucence. Few if any other fine-art or commercial photographers do work like Burnstine's."

(Full article)

Yearn

 

For more information about Susan's work or her 2011 Prix de la Photographie Paris award winning book, Within Shadows, contact us here at the John Cleary Gallery!

Congratulations Mitch Dobrowner: 2012 Sony World Photographer Award Winner

 

We are very pleased to announce John Cleary Gallery photographer, Mitch Dobrowner, has been awarded the 2012 Sony World Photographer award for his Storm series.

Jupiter, Mobridge, South Dakota, 2011

 

In a selection process that began with over 100,000 applicants from 171 different countries from across the globe, Mitch's stunning images blew away the competition to nab the $25,000 price along with Sony's most recent digital imaging equipment.

Mammatus, Texline, Texas, 2011

 

W.M. Hunt, chairman of the judging committee, had these kind words to say of Mitch and his work:

There is enormous pleasure in the jury's selection of Mitch Dobrowner because he is the best of what is classic and what is contemporary in photography.

He brings a sense of its history and enormous skill in his craft while pushing his imagination and, even, physical strength. The work offers a visceral rush while being wonderfully well made. I think he is an exceptional choice.

Mesocyclone, Valentine, Nebraska, 2011

 

Born and raised on Log Island, New York, Mitch began his photography career the moment his father gave him an old Argus rangefinder.  At the age of twenty one he quit his job and toured the American Southwest, finding inspiration in the limitlessness of the natural landscapes and the photography of artists like Ansel Adams and Minor White.  It is no wonder then that Mitch's work exudes a reverenced solemnity for the American vistas in his landscape portraits and the tumultuous elegance of the elements in his Storm series.

For the full announcement, please click here.