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Current
Upcoming Past Touring |
Main Gallery
May 10 to June 14, 2008 E.J. Bellocq Storyville Portraits |
Opening / Panel Discussion / Film Screening Saturday May 10 2pm to 5pm Lunchtime talks at 12:05 and 12:35 Tuesday May 27 Wednesday May 28 Thursday May 29 |
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E.J. Bellocq's Storyville Portraits were made in New Orleans between 1911 and 1913, in the red-light district known as Storyville. The glass plate negatives were discovered after Bellocq's death in 1949, and were eventually purchased by American photographer Lee Friedlander in the 1960s. Friedlander made prints from the negatives on printing-out paper exposed to daylight for several days &mdash a technique used in Bellocq's time &mdash and then "aged" them through toning. Ever since their first exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in 1970, these images have become known worldwide; this is their first showing in Vancouver. Bellocq's photographs appear to be simple portraits, yet they remain infinitely complex and contested photographic territory. They offer privileged access to a semi-private world that has been, depending on your view, either invaded by, or sensitively portrayed by his camera. In either case, the images raise issues surrounding the representation of women, and their place and perceived value in society, both then and now. This exhibition comes at a time when prostitution is a growing global issue. Bellocq's portraits are, as Susan Sontag has pointed out, "one of the most admired recoveries in photography's widening, ever incomplete history." Storyville Portraits are a generous loan from Carole and Howard Tanenbaum, Toronto. Curated by Bill Jeffries. Panel discussion/film screening: Sat May 10, 2pm Mary Lynn Stewart (Chair, Women's Studies, SFU) will discuss photographs of women in fin-de-siècle France, including representations of women in French bordellos. Priya Ramu (Host-on-leave, CBC Radio's On the Coast) will screen the documentary she co-produced for VSO Canada, called Brothel Justice, about a group of sex workers in Bangladesh. Followed by a reception. Lunchtime talks at 12:05pm and 12:35pm on: Tuesday May 27, Wednesday May 28, Thursday May 29 Additional talks may be scheduled, contact us at: 778.782.4266 or gallery@sfu.ca. FREE PARKING! May 10 only Use this page as your visitor parking pass in any Visitor Lot at SFU (face up on dashboard or hand to attendant). |
Storyville Portrait, ca 1912 ©Lee Friedlander, courtesy Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco 
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