Familiar Strangers
Matthews Gallery | May 2014
Vernacular photography presents unique challenges to the viewer, asking us to shift between different roles to grasp what we’re seeing. Our first impulse is often voyeuristic. We can’t resist a peek at someone’s intimate moment, and we swiftly draw conclusions about what’s going on. Familiar Strangers is a group exhibition of anonymous artists that celebrates this insatiable curiosity.
Society often slaps us on the wrist for our voyeuristic tendencies. In his brilliant essay on found photography, Dr. Barry Mauer says this instinct is something we should indulge. “At first sight, (great vernacular photographs) are hilarious or tragic or both,” writes Mauer. “Voyeurism allows me to experience these reactions from a comfortable distance.” However, Mauer cautions against stopping there. Voyeurism often comes hand-in-hand with judgment and categorization. Stereotyping these mysterious individuals cuts us off from a rich world of visual clues to their real stories. It’s time to pull out the magnifying glass.
Analyzing and relating to the “characters” in vernacular photographs helps develop our skills in another field: humanism. It’s amazing how connected we can feel to a person we’ll never meet, and how powerful our feelings of empathy can be when we choose to exercise them. Look long enough, and you’ll start to imagine that these familiar strangers are looking right back.
Press
“Juxtaposing the mundane with hints of sublime, forgotten moments of a couple posing in front of a petrified tree at a national forest, a freshly landed trapeze artist and a plaid-clad boy riding his bicycle pepper the exhibit.”
— Enrique Limón, Santa Fe Reporter
My contributions: Curatorial with Lawrence Matthews, didactics, exhibition design, press relations, blogging