New Photography 2007 Panned by New York Times

I always love a good photography exhibit, especially if it concerns old photographs from the mid-century (in the image above, please find an image of me in 1978).

I think that just about every other photograph taken of people from that era looks experimental, because it was an experimental time.

In the mid-century people were experimenting not only with sex, drugs and rock-in-roll, but also with fashion from hair to clothing.

Just look at the picture above and you'll see an Afro hairdo on a white person. If you saw that in the 40s, the person wearing it probably would have had to undergo electric shock therapy.

There's a show at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City that emphasizes an old photography style, which I think can be referred to as experimental mid-century or photographing in an experimental era, an era when society was in flux. The review in the New York Times refers to this type of photography as the Diane Arbus school (Arbus photographed random subjects during the mid-century).

There are two rooms to the MOMA's exhibit, one in which the photographs of Eadweard Muybridge, Alfred Stieglitz and Clarence White are presented, and another where the photographs of some new artists can be viewed. Much of the old photography is from the early part of the twentieth century.

While the Times dismisses the new photographers as a group who provide nothing fresh, they do point out one whose work is associated with the Arbus school. This work is from Tanyth Berkeley and the image they highlight is "Grace in Window."

I agree with the Times comparison of this artist's work with Diane Arbus. Arbus worked with very real (offbeat) subjects in a very real (odd) world. Berkeley works with similar subjects, but, as I see it, her subjects are less varied and the context in which she presents them less informative.

Arbus used some very interesting backgrounds and framed her subjects from a distance. Berkeley's art is limited in subject matter (mostly women) and there's almost no background as most of her images are close-ups.