*Taxter & Spengemann on East 12th Street (btw 3rd & 4th Aves) presents photo works by Adam Putnam. According to his 2001 Artist Statement, the 36-year-old, New York City-born Putnam is 6'8". Living in such a confined city and being so tall has given the artist "a hypersensitivity to space." Physical space and his body are often subjects in his work. Standing in the center of the gallery space is a tall, brick tower which, according to the exhibit's convoluted press release, "stands erect as a marker of time" representing presence, being, and other concepts I just couldn't understand. Putnam's dark photos show his face behind a mask of tape or wrapped in wires, his leg freakishly disfigured by an attached prosthetic arm. His images give a sense of restrictiveness and uneasiness. See taxterandspengemann.com. Read Putnam's Artist Statement here, and read his 2008 Whitney Biennial bio at Whitney.org. Through October 17th.
*Currently on view at Yancey Richardson is Tout va disparaitre (Everything will pass), a selection of works by Dutch photographer Hellen van Meene taken between 2007-2009 in New York City, the American South, Russia and the Netherlands. Born in 1972 in Alkmaar, Holland, van Meene primarily focuses her lens on children capturing them in documentary type shots (like her photos taken in America during a road trip from Florida to New Orleans) or in fictional worlds (like her works taken in Holland and Russia). Her series Pool of Tears shot in 2008 in an abandoned house in Holland shows some ghostly, creepy looking kiddies. Though her approaches are vastly different, all her results come out cinematic and narrative. This exhibit coincides with the release of her new, eponymous book. Learn more at Yanceyrichardson.com. Through October 31st.
*The Matthew Marks space on West 22nd Street is currently exhibiting Peter Hujar: Photographs 1956-1958. Taken while Hujar (1934-1987) was 22-24 years-old in four locales - New York City, Southbury, CT, Key West, FL, and Florence, Italy, the photos focus on developmentally disabled children.
These beautiful, candid, black and white photos show the children at play, and Hujar's affection and respect for them is strongly felt in every frame. As the press release for the exhibit so aptly states, "Highly emotional yet stripped of excess, Hujar's photographs find beauty in the unconventional." See more at Matthewmarks.com. Through October 24th.
Hujar was a prominent figure in New York City's downtown art and music scenes in the 1970s and 80s and was greatly admired by his peers. He left behind an immense and powerful collection of work before succumbing to AIDS in 1987. Two extra samples of Hujar's intimate and evocative style are his gorgeous and haunting pictures of Candy Darling on her deathbed taken in 1974 that recently appeared as cover art for Antony and the Johnsons' debut album I Am A Bird Now and EP The Lake.
*Danziger Projects presents Weston's Westons, a collection of rare and iconic photographs taken by the legendary American photographer, Edward Weston (1886-1958), and printed by his son Cole Weston.
According to the exhibit's press release, Edward Weston typically and painstakingly made his own prints, "noting on each negative envelope the various idiosyncrasies of each picture." After he'd gotten older and Parkinson's Disease had affected his mobility, Weston's sons (initially Brett, but then Cole took over completely) began printing for him "under his strict supervision." What pressure!
Weston passed away in 1958 after a decade of working with his son, but Cole continued printing his father's work for 30 years. In 1988 he decided to focus on his own photography. Edward Weston had stated in his will that no one else could print from his original negatives which are now stored away at The Center for Creative Photography in Tucson, Arizona.
The prints on view at Danziger were picked from the Cole Weston Trust and have never been up for sale - some have never been published! Some familiar nudes, peppers, shells, and sand dunes, accompanied by some never-before-seen works, still look sleek, elegant, and contemporary. Learn more at Danzigerprojects.com. Through October 24th.
*Milk Gallery is featuring the works of long-time photographer, Sam Haskins, perhaps best-known for his influential, "style defining," 1964 book, Cowboy Kate which according to the exhibit's press release "remains to this day one of the most important black and white books of post war creative photography." This claims seems pretty accurate considering the tome is always prominently displayed in every bookshop's art section.
Born in South Africa in 1926, Haskins' illustrious career started in Johannesburg where he produced Cowboy Kate along with three other creative black and white books - Five Girls, November Girl, and African Image. In 1968, Haskins moved to London where he had a studio for 35 years. Now living in Australia, Haskins still shoots for fashion magazines and releases his first book in 25 years, Fashion Etcetera, this month. As the press release sums up his work, Haskin's "photography is unapologetically celebratory of women, beauty, art, nature, graphics, illustration, design and photography itself." See Milkstudios.com. Through October 26th.
The New York Times' The Moment Blog has a short video featuring Haskins and his work. According to the Times' Horacio Silva, Haskins, who is in NYC to promote Fashion Etcetera, suffered a stroke on Sunday and is still in hospital. Get well soon, Sam! Watch the video at Themoment,blogs.nytimes.com.
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