SF Camerawork | Past Exhibitions: Summer 2007

Summer 2007 Exhibitions
7 June - 25 August, 2007
Opening Reception: Thursday 7 June, 5 - 8 pm
Opening Reception for I'm Afraid I Love You:
Thursday 19 July @ 5 pm

IN GALLERY ONE

Debut of Camerawork's New Works Program,
designed to foster the creation and presentation of work by notable
emerging artists who explore innovative, and often challenging,
visions through photography and related visual media.

Opening in mid-July
17 July - 25 August
Opening Reception: Thursday 19 July @ 5 pm

Greg Halpern :
I'm Afraid I Love You

Photo credit: Greg Halpern

Most of the images in Greg Halpern’s installation,
I’m Afraid I Love You, were made in Buffalo, New York,
though, at times, it seemed appropriate for Halpern to use other settings
to describe his hometown. The focus of Halpern’s interest and work is
less about a city with a declining population and more about a sense of perseverance and resistance—the mysterious fact that
this dying city is also a source of life.

Conceived as a series of visual sentences laid out in staccato form,
the modesty of Halpern’s noir-like images and installation reflects
the artist’s overall conceptual approach to his subject matter. Halpern notes, “How does one visually approach such a place and its people, without
resorting to cliché, without causing insult, and without simplifying?
It is as if sitting bedside, respectfully struggling to comprehend the
significance of a dwindling life, both troubled and inspired by what
appears to be an amalgam of greatness, misery, and mystery.”

SF Camerawork’s New Works Program is supported by a
grant from the Andy Warhol Foundation for Visual Arts.

IN GALLERY TWO
7 June - 25 August
Opening Reception: Thursday 7 June @ 5 pm

WANG Ningde:
Some Days

Co-presented with the Chinese Culture Center of San Francisco

WANG Ningde is one of the most critically-acclaimed and important contemporary photographers working in China today. This is his first exhibition in California and is the first in a series of concentrated artist projects featuring photographers who live and work in China being presented at SF Camerawork over the next two years. He belongs to a generation of young photographers whose work addresses the rapid changes taking place in 21st Century China. Although a photojournalist by trade, Wang maintains a
strong belief that photography is a tool for self-expression and makes non-documentary, conceptual photography. His work invites the viewer into a world where subtle narrative drama expressively connects
memory with the reality of the present moment.

SF Camerawork’s new Chinese Artists Series is supported by grants from the Andy Warhol Foundation for Visual Arts and the Columbia Foundation.

Curated by Terri Whitlock, curatorial associate in the Department of Photography at SFMOMA, The Spitting Image honors the anniversary of the feminist art movement and features the work of four young women artists who, each in their own way, investigate the gestures, costumes, and settings embedded in the representation of female identity.

Bay Area photographer Morgan Konn provokes the notion of identity envy
in a body of work called Her House, Her Clothes in which Konn gains access
to women’s houses and photographs herself inhabiting their domestic space
and dressing in their clothes. For her series Double Life, Midwest-based photographer Kelli Connell employs digital techniques to construct
seemingly authentic pictures of a relationship between two women,
but which, in fact, use the same woman subject in each role.
Collaborative artists Tarrah Krajnak and Wilka Roig look closely
at the relationship of photography to identity; to the ways in which
identity is not simply performed, but performed for the camera.

The Spitting Image is supported by a grant
from the Phyllis C. Wattis Foundation.

This exhibit was curated by students in Mills' Museum Studies Workshop in consultation with Sharon E. Bliss, art history lecturer, and Terrie Vevea, a former member of the Workshop who served as project coordinator.

The exhibit of more than 100 photographs will include images about
identity created in conjunction with The Contemporary Jewish Museum
(San Francisco), photos exploring relationships culled from our book
First Exposures, photos from a public art project on tolerance and
acceptance, and work by an 11 year-old girl taken at the
40th anniversary celebration of the Black Panther Party.
Many of these pieces have not been exhibited before.

The Mills Museum Studies Workshop engages students in basic questions
about the nature of art museums and curatorial practices, particularly the
proper handling and care of works of art. In addition to completing
weekly readings and written assignments, students attend local exhibitions
and lectures. Their final project is a group-curated exhibition shown in
the Mills College Art Museum during the summer or fall semester.

Museum Hours: Tuesday, Thursday - Saturday, 11 am - 4 pm;
Wednesday, 11 am - 7:30 pm; Sunday, Noon - 4 pm.

Past Exhibitions
View descriptions and selected photos from
exhibitions of the past few years here.

Admission:
(suggested donation)
$5 for general public
$2 for students and seniors
FREE for SFCW members
Open late First Thursday of each month
Free admission First Tuesday of each month