Houston, TX – Please note changes to HCP's Exhibition Schedule: Human Nature is extended through May 14; Infected Landscape, HCP's Fellowship Exhibition and PictureThis! will open on Thursday, May 21, 2009 and continue through June 18, 2009. The opening reception for all exhibitions is on Thursday, May 21, 2009 from 6 – 8 p.m. Juror Natasha Egan will speak with Natan Dvir at 5:30 p.m. on May 21, and Prince V. Thomas will speak about his work on June 11 at 6:30 p.m.
In a diverse array of exhibitions covering issues such as poverty, national boundaries, health, and explorations of the human condition, Houston Center for Photography presents the work of Israeli-born Shai Kremer and Natan Dvir and Houstonian Prince V. Thomas. HCP’s Learning Center exhibition space will feature PictureThis!, the organization’s outreach program with the Children’s Hospital at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Clinic in Houstonand Texas Children’s Cancer Center. All exhibitions will be on view at HCP May 21 – June 28, 2009. The opening reception for all exhibitions is on May 21, 2009 from 6 – 8 p.m.
Main Gallery - Begun in 1999 and completed in 2007, Shai Kremer’s Infected Landscape depicts Israel’s terrain altered by the destructive nature of long running conflicts as well as by the highly visable Israeli military presence in the country. From the most obvious of physical marks to the most subtle, the photographs describe the history of Israel’s relationship with surrounding territories. Border walls, abandoned aircraft and blast walls painted to imitate the vistas they hide are perhaps the most easily recognizable markings of conflict. Yet, overgrown tank barriers and burned olive groves represent the long history of conflict. The exhibition is accompanied by the monograph Infected Landscape (2008, Dewi Lewis Publishing). Kremer is based in New York and Tel Aviv and has had solo exhibitions in the USA, China, and Europe. He was a finalist for the 2007 Aperture Prize and the 2007 HSBC Award, and a runner-up in the 2007 Aperture Portfolio Prize.
Galleries X & Y - This year’s fellowship juror Natasha Egan, Associate Director and Curator of the Museum of Contemporary Photography, Columbia College in Chicago, selected Prince V. Thomas for the Carol Crow Memorial Fellowship and Israeli photojournalist Natan Dvir for the HCP Fellowship. Thomas will present his new work On Joy, On Sorrow, a two-channel video installation with music scored by composer Joel Love. The installation attempts to abstractly convey the interdependent relationship of two seemingly disparate emotions. Natan Dvir, recipient of the Houston Center for Photography Fellowship, will exhibit photographs from his ongoing series Shelter, which is about the increasing global neglect of refugees and those displaced within their own countries by conflict and persecution. Dvir is the recipient of Les Recontres d’Arles 2007 Prix de l'Edition, Best Documentary Project by Photo District News in 2006, and the Santa Fe Image award, honorable mention, in 2008. HCP will exhibit selections from Dvir’s studies in Israel and Columbia. Dvir will discuss his project on May 21 at 5:30 p.m.; Thomas will speak on June 11 at 6:30 p.m.
Learning Center Gallery - Currently in its seventh year, HCP’s PictureThis! outreach program with The Children’s Hospital at the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Clinic and the Texas Children’s Cancer Center, both in Houston, will culminate in an exhibition of work by this year’s participants. The program provides children with cancer and blood disorders the opportunity to explore their worlds in innovative, unique ways.
Infected Landscape is made possible thanks to Julie Saul Gallery, NY and Joan Morgenstern; HCP’s Fellowship exhibitions are made possible thanks to James Edward Maloney and an anonymous donor; PictureThis! is made possible from support by the Clayton Dabney Foundation and Texas Commission on the Arts.