Gordon Parks at the International Center of Photography

Gordon Parks: 100 Years  International Center of Photography

May 18, 2012–January 6, 2013

Gordon Parks, Bessie and Little Richard the Morning After She Scalded Her Husband, 

The International Center of Photography is celebrating one of America’s most important photographers, Gordon Parks. This exhibit celebrates the 100^th anniversary of his birth.

The exhibit will be seen not just by those who go inside the center but will be seen by passers-by on the street as well. This exhibit is mounted in the windows is not inside the center but in its windows on Avenue of the Harlem, New York, 1968. © The Gordon Parks Foundation.Americas and 43rd Street. Passers-by will see a giant photo mural along with 54 images shown on three flat screens. They can even use their cell phones to hear recordings of Mr. Parks discussing his work.

“The show’s curator, Maurice Berger, views Mr. Parks as a “classic American cultural figure who came from poverty and prejudice and wound up as one of the seminal photographers of the mid- and late-20th century.” “I think it’s time for a new generation to know who he is,” he said.

Read more at the Lens blog at the New York Times,  A Gift to New York from Gordon Parks

and here EmpatheticPortraits of a Segregated Nation.

A selection of items on Gordon Parks located at the Central Library of Rochester and Monroe County.

This is a DVD

This is the book

The Barnes Foundation Opens Today May 19, 2012

Opens today Mary, 19, 2012 at its new location in Philadelphia.

Johann Adam Eyer American, 1755–1837, active c. 1779–1820

Cover for a Book of Copy Models (Vorschriften-Büchlein)

The Barnes Foundation which dates back to 1922, is an American art and horticultural institution now located as of today May 19, 2012 in downtown Philadelphia. Their mission is, "the promotion of the advancement of education and the appreciation of the fine arts.” 

The Foundation owns about 2,500 objects. The collection includes some of the world's finest impressionist, post-impressionist, and early modern paintings. The collection also has holdings by leading European and American artists, as well as ancient works from other cultures.  The grounds, which were developed by Laura Barnes and includes the Arboretum of  the Barnes Foundation, which is located in Merion, PA.

The Eerie and Beautiful Dolls Françoise Duvivier

Another doll artist I came across probably around the the same time I found shadow box maker Dusty Gernard. As a person who has made dolls when I see work by someone who makes dolls like 
Françoise Duvivier it needs to be told so others can see what she creates. 


From France, Françoise Duvivier is a collage artist with a curious passion for dolls. She is best known for the often violent imagery in her collages, which have been collected into a book Dive/Duvivier: Works (a limited edition book released by Italy's Minus Habens Press). Duvivier's dolls are handmade, eerie, ritualistic and precious. Typically her dolls appear aged, with shriveled skin and tortured faces. They are nevertheless lovingly dressed in strange clothes of mourning, recalling past days in a simpler world, a world where superstition was still a thing of power. A collection of nine of Duvivier's dolls were presented, chosen from amongst dozens of completed works.




The Devotional Art of Francoise Duvivier (from SENSORIA FROM CENSORIUM Magazine): "Francoise Duvivier...devotes her considerable talents to crafting skillful and disarming works of art. A prolific collage artist and former small-press publisher of the impressive magazine METRO RIQUET, Francoise also crafts exquisite hand-made dolls. Each doll is imbued with a touching, at times disquieting humanity, fashioned with subtly and photographed by Francoise with a tender, candid bleakness that reveals the talents of a complex and sophisticated artist. "I remember my first doll I made myself when I was a child & shy; I was far away from home in the Big Garden. It was a creature made of a bottle cork, and two tree branches and a piece of fabric, and it was my first friend."




Partial Artist Statement from the Lazarus Corporation
"In a controlled and supposedly normal world, it is impossible to live without making big concessions in order to survive, one day to die "empty." As an artist, I want to express this smothering and to parody it in all its paroxysm through my art work. It is a direct language wich speaks deeply about our primitive agitation."


From her site Damaged Corpse
"The dementia dolls give me a feeling of old rituals, like being reminded of something ancient and buried-but also new and just born? Something beautiful, but hidden, a thing that should be buried in a grave, but has emerged to climb the trees. Strange. Spooky. Like a memory that never goes away, always looking down upon you."

More of her exquisite dolls

The Doll House (1999).