San Francisco Camera Work Gallery
April 2 – May 23, 2009
Opening Reception: April 2, 2009, 5 – 8 pm
Delicately manipulating imagery to create black and white Polaroid photographs that subtly explore ways in which our actions alter the natural landscape, McFarland’s photographs serve, he notes, as “witness to the landscape, showing its history, our trace in it, and admiring its beauty.”
Celebrating the work of Sean McFarland, recipient of the 6th annual Baum Award for Emerging American Photographers and San Francisco’s first photographer to win this prestigious national award, SF Camerawork will feature McFarland’s series Pictures of the Earth. The Baum Award for Emerging American Photographers is one of the largest national awards available in photography, and the only award in the United States to single out ‘emerging’ photographers for support. Through the generosity of Glenn and April Bucksbaum of The Baum Foundation, this $10,000 cash grant honors a talented and innovative photographer at a pivotal moment in the development of his or her career.
Also on view:
Chaos, disorder, family gatherings, game playing…these scenarios dominate Julie Blackmon’s large scale color prints. Like Alice in Wonderland, Blackmon’s young subjects appear in reality and fantasy, engrossed in their created worlds.
Guest Curated by David Spalding
Even in Arcadia, guest-curated by David Spalding, Curator at the Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (Beijing), combines the photography of Liu Gang and the video work of Wang Jianwei, which examine the far-flung fantasies, grim realities, and stark contradictions that often define life in China today.