LOFT | 30 presents In The Afterwards | Silvia Martinez-Kuti and Pamela Jones
Photography exhibition and gallery launch within art-appropriated Williamsburg high-rise to benefit Haitian charities
New York, May 1st, 2009 – “Rich” is definitely not a word that some would apply to the locales photographers Silvia Martinez-Kuti and Pamela Jones document in their first combined show In The Afterwards. But as both artists capture worn cobble-stoned alleyways and stained stucco facades, be they near the Malecone of Cuba or within the poverty-stricken streets of Haiti – both women arrive withtextures, portraits and hues that are exactly this: rich. Sculpted predominantly in lush black and white, their portraits of street life have been selected to launch Williamsburg’s newest gallery space, LOFT | 30, in an opening to benefit Haiti’s Yéle Foundation. The VERNISSAGE is to run from 7-10pm at SILVERSHED – a "friend" gallery in Chelsea... but LOFT | 30 will open for business in its stunning location in WIlliamsburg next week.
A sign of the times, with artists and philanthropists inhabiting what would otherwise be thought of as residential and luxury, LOFT | 30’s decision to cohabitate within a domestic environment appears to be a deliberate statement against the art world’s ever isolative circles. And as a gallery attempts to make more intimate, and more pedestrian, what is otherwise exclusive and luxurious, no more fitting work could be exhibited to illustrate the world’s changing financial and social sphere away from gaudy self-indulgence
than the humble sensibilities evident in Martinez-Kuti and Jones.
“No matter who you are, it’s impossible to go to Haiti and remain indifferent,” says Jones of her street portraits of men, women and children, their round faces flush with telling smiles in the numerous snapshots of posed Haitians, newly reprieved from tropical storms and hurricanes Hanna, Ike, Gustav and Fay. Though Jones’ more tactile, more intimate moments contrast Martinez-Kuti’s wider, more narrative, more removed compositions – Martinez-Kuti’s images of, and reactions to her subject are just as emboldened. “This series of aluminum photos represent many days of walking through Havana’s most impoverished areas,” she says. “But beyond the poverty, I wanted to see the people. I wanted to see their unknown, real life.”
As gallery founder Luca Zerbini and gallery director Ambre Kelly plan a season of exhibitions showcasing the unknown and community artists residing within the five boroughs, their decision to begin internationally does not do a disservice to their intention. “These photos of unknown people outside of the country symbolize the unknown artists we are looking to uncover in our back yard,” says Zerbini, an art lover from an early age. “The most enlightening thing about travel is realizing how little you look at your own streetcorner,
how little you really observe your own sites and people, no matter where you are.” Kelly, who has lived throughout Europe, adds, “it is travel which helps you readjust your perspective to better incorporate your native soil. And, by beginning with a careful exploration of these foreign places with In The Afterwards, that is exactly the trajectory the gallery hopes to mirror. A global perspective that helps better locate a local one.”
In The Afterwards | Photography by Silvia Martinez-Kuti and Pamela Jones
LOFT | 30 4 North 5th Street, One Northside Piers, PH 2 Brooklyn NY 11211
For more information please contact Ambre Kelly at ambre.kelly@loft30.com
VERNISSAGE: SILVERSHED 7-9 PM on Saturday May 16th, 2009
LOCATION: 119 West 25th Street, PH & Rooftop
New York, NY 10001
