AIPAD Highlight #1…
AIPAD is my idea of heaven on earth. In fact, I would much prefer it to the biblical concept of heaven. Eighty photograph dealers, showing works from Talbot to… well, Larry Towell (who the heck is Larry Towell you might ask? Or maybe it’s just me who was unfamiliar with his work?) The world gets shut out when you walk in the Armory doors at AIPAD and you are allowed to simply wallow in photographs. Every kind of photograph.For three days. Not only fabulous historic images, but who’s new and now all over the globe.
AIPAD was March 26-29 this year (here’s an article about it from ArtInfo) – it’s always in NYC and draws dealers from all over the globe.
That’s why I know about Larry Towell. Not only is he a fellow citizen (confession: I’m a Canadian) but he is one unforgettable photographer.
I wanted to meet Stephen Bulger, of Stephen Bulger Gallery to ask him if his gallery was actually the only photography gallery in Canada. Yes. (It’s these kinds of things that make me forever grateful I live here.) But as we talked, my eyes kept straying to a very large black and white image behind him of a little girl in a tree reaching down to her cat.
Naomi in Hollow Tree with Cat, Lambton County, Ontario, Canada, 1990 © Larry Towell / Magnum Photos, courtesy of Stephen Bulger Gallery
Larry Towell is represented by Stephen Bulger Gallery and is a member of the venerable MAGNUM and that is an interesting story in itself. In the late 80′s he sent a huge portfolio of photographs to them he had taken while in El Salvador, rather than just leave them to lie fallow in a drawer. He didn’t consider himself a photographer at the time and had never heard of MAGNUM before. In a nutshell, they invited him to join MAGNUM and he kept telling them he had no idea who they were, just archive the photographs, and why would he want to join them? He knows why now.
So, Larry Towell shoots pictures all over the world. But his collection of images of his family at home on their rural 75 acres in Ontario are truly some of the most genuine images I have ever seen.
I love Sally Mann’s work and Towell’s images included in his 2008 show called “The World from My Front Porch” are of that ilk. Great angles, really gutsy risk-taking in many ways and completely un-selfconscious – both photographer and subjects. The word I keep coming back to is…tender.
Lambton County, Ontario, Canada, 1989 © Larry Towell / Magnum Photos, courtesy of Stephen Bulger Gallery
It is a memorable body of work, these private photographs of a family’s life. And it’s very clear this small circle of people does not need the world outside of their 75 acres to augment or complete their lives in any way. As you delve into the work you’ll see it’s not all innocence, however. There’s a slight sense of menace that can’t be discounted in many of the images, as in the one below.
Naomi in an Abandoned House, Lambton County, Ontario, Canada, 1992 © Larry Towell / Magnum Photos, courtesy of Stephen Bulger Gallery
One of my favorite shots in this series is “Moses and Cows, Lambton County, Ontario, Canada, 1995″. Get online to the Stephen Bulger Gallery and check it out, along with many others on the same page.
It’s April – the month of rain. So take your time and root around on the Stephen Bulger Gallery site while you wait for spring to come (hope springs eternal). It may be the only photography gallery in Canada, but with an artist list like it has, who cares?
