February 4 - March 2, 1999

Lynne Brown
Allan deSouza
Jessica Flynn
James Hajicek
Mary Daniel Hobson
Shirley Rae Parini
Liza Ryan
Lincoln Hale Turner

Body / Language explores the complicated intersection between mind and body, bringing together works in which language is used to situate the body in relation to the self. The exhibition elucidates the myriad of ways in which physical experience is understood through language, investigating a diversity of issues and concerns about the body and its cultural and existential identity. Often working with layering and collage elements, the artists featured in this exhibition allow both the body and language to become intimate partners in describing the self.

Corroborations: Ongoing Weavings in Photography and Sculpture
James Fee and George Herms

March 26 - May 5, 1999

In Moving Forward / Looking Back, Los Angeles photographer James Fee unravels the myth of America in poetic images of factories, broken machinery, decaying buildings, cars, and stranded ships. Fee's images question a country's faith in the symbols of its strength. With an archaeologist's eye for the significance of the detritus of civilization, Fee pores over the American landscape, creating iconic views of a country trapped by a dream of progress and industrialization.This exhibition of James Fee's work is presented in association with Debra Heimerdinger / Fine Art Photographs.

Corroborations: Ongoing Weavings of Photography and Sculpture presents collaborative assemblages by James Fee and sculptor George Herms. Their partnership has spawned an imaginative investigation of the interface between their two mediums: creating both photo-based sculptures and sculpture-based photographs, each artist brings an understanding of his medium to the creative process, engaging new perspectives on the cultural artifacts which inspire them both. Their shared interest in the American past has led to a fertile interchange of ideas, engendering works which explore a range of social metaphor gleaned from the objects they examine.

May 18 - June 26, 1999

The last project of artist Christine Tamblyn (1951-1998), Archival Quality, considers the formal tensions between a virtual and a real archive. Mining her own life for material, Tamblyn examines her own accumulated personal documentation in both physical and digital form, as a CD-ROM. The documentation includes the multitude of materials of Tamblyn's life - artwork, critical writings, business files, and audiotapes, as well as more personal records such as letters, diaries, and dresses. The totality of the exhibition serves as a testament to the overwhelming scope and complexity of an individual life and explores how one understands a life archived in this manner.

Archival Quality is a traveling exhibition produced by the Los Angeles Center for Photographic Studies, with the generous support of the National Endowment for the Arts, the Los Angeles Cultural Affairs Department, and the David Bermant Foundation.

July 8 - August 14, 1999

Johnna K. Arnold
Chloe Atkins
David Berg
Robert Carey
Christine Cobaugh
Lyda Cort
E.G. Crichton
Lydia Dickerson
Beth Yarnelle Edwards
Maizie Gilbert
Robert Goss
Astrid Hermes
Clint Imboden
Eirik Johnson
Heather de Koning
Lisa Levine
David Lewis
Tom Loeb
David Pace
Aaron Plant
Patty Reece
Patricia D. Richards
Charlotte Whitmore
Sharon M. Wickham
David Wolf

In recognition of twenty-five years of support from Camerawork members, Commotion: The 1999 Members Exhibition honors the work of twenty-five exciting emerging photographers working today. The exhibition showcases a diverse range of contemporary photography, from conceptual work such as David Berg's painted landscapes printed as photographs and David Pace's object inventories to documentary projects like Beth Yarnelle Edwards' environmental portraits and Patricia D. Richards' series of suburban Texas teenagers.

Commotion was juried by: Rena Bransten, Owner, Rena Bransten Gallery; Luis Delgado-Qualtrough, artist; Marnie Gillett, Executive Director, SF Camerawork; and Tim Wride, Associate Curator of Photography, Los Angeles County Museum of Art.

September 7 - October 9, 1999

Stephane Couturier
Robbert Flick
Henrik Kam

A Tale of Three Cities brings together the work of Stephane Couturier, Robbert Flick, and Henrik Kam. Photographing, respectively, in Paris, Los Angeles and San Francisco, their work is an archaeology of urbanism which contemplates the ebb and flow of time and change in our cities through their infrastructure.

This exhibition is part of Côte Ouest: A Season of French Contemporary Art. It is made possible by the support of the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and French Cultural Services.

October 15 - November 20, 1999

Rattling the Frame: The Photographic Space 1974-1999, Camerawork’s twenty-fifth anniversary exhibition, celebrates the work by artists who have had an innovative impact on photography and photo-related media in the past quarter century.

Artists include: Aziz + Cucher, John Baldessari, Lewis Baltz, Uta Barth, Sophie Calle, Peter Garfield, Betty Hahn, Robert Heinecken, Alfredo Jaar, Kahn/Selesnick, Mark Klett, Barbara Kruger, MANUAL (Bloom/Hill), Ray Metzker, Duane Michals, Tracey Moffat, Vik Muniz, John O'Reilly, Michael Rovner, Cindy Sherman, Joachim Schmid, Kim Stringfellow, Carrie Mae Weems, Joel-Peter Witkin, and others.

Rattling the Frame: The Photographic Space 1974-1999 has been supported in part by a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. SF Camerawork's 25th Anniversary is generously supported by Banana Republic.

Camerawork: A Journal of Photographic Arts
Fall/Winter 1999, Vol. 26, No. 2
Rattling the Frame: The Photographic Space 1974-1999

December 10, 1999 - January 29, 2000

The Image After presents three artists exploring the idea of the eternal image which resonates through time. Danish artist Torben Eskerod photographs anonymous death masks of politicians, scientists, and writers, the makers of modern Denmark, from the collection of the Museum of National History at Frederiksberg Castle. These images expose the captured souls the masks embody with a vivid realism: the faces retain the tangible tactility of their flesh and appear so corporeal so as to appear to melt the line between life and death. Spanish photographer Joan Fontcuberta's series Constellations explores the photographic reflection of life past and present. His mysterious images of fabricated "constellations" consider the manufacturing of individual and collective memory and the scientific pretension of irrevocable proof. By means of satirical critique, Fontcuberta's images question our belief in the photograph as an irreproachable document. Italian artist Silvio Wolf's installation is based on projections of positive and negative images of the Shroud of Turin, which is, to the artist, a light-generated image. Wolfe investigates its immateriality, ambiguity, and uncertainty, creating images of both life and afterlife.