Stephen Wirtz Gallery announces an exhibition of Polaroid images by renowned
photographer Barbara Crane.
Exhibition dates: September 9 - October 16, 2010
Opening reception Thursday, September 9, 2010, 5:30-7:30 PM
During the early 1980's, Barbara Crane spent a few hot summers lugging around a heavy Super Graphic 45 camera and boxes Polaroid film though the summer festivals of Chicago. The closely cropped photographs, exposing subtle gestures of human interaction usually lost in the sea of glistening human flesh, where published in a small book by Aperture last year. Crane separates her subjects from the chaos that they are surrounded by to expose beautiful moments of intimacy.
"The display in these photographs comes from the spark of individual people, not from a style celebrating apathy and malaise, robots on the assembly line of consumerism. These photographs celebrate summer days, steamy Chicago nights, endless desires fulfilled and postponed. Photography has often been called mirror and window: it is also a prism reflecting the intersections between the photographer, subject, and viewer. Prisms are faceted; Barbara Crane creates diamonds of perception and feeling." - Richard Gordon
“I have treasured these pictures for their depiction of universal experiences, yet they are also a record of a specific moment in time as communicated via the unique – and now, sadly obsolete – photographic medium of the Polaroid. These images were shot during the heat of summer days, very close to the subjects, as I struggled to carry a hand-held 4 by 5 Super Graphic 45 camera, boxes of Polaroid sheet film, and a Polaroid film back. These photographs are truly labors of love.” - Barbara Crane