Metropolitan is a long time member of the College Art Association. We will be exhibiting at their annual book and trade fair. We have been exhibiting at the fair for many years because we have many fine art instructors and students for customers. It is a good way to introduce new products as well as learn about what are customer’s needs are.  It is always fun to talk to students about how to frame fine art. We can provide low priced options and framing advice to make sure they learn the professional way of framing and mounting an exhibition. Coming soon to our site will be youtube videos that will give detailed advice on all the different aspects of framing. If your going to the show please stop by and say hello.

We have many interesting customers. Jeffris Elliott is certainly one of them. I was immediately impressed and moved by the work. He is having a major exhibition at the Depot Building in Telluride Colorado . The following is a description of his work in his own words. I have added the link to Minor White to help put his work into historical context.

Artist Statement

“My entire photographic experience has been centered around form, light and a spiritual search. Years before I apprenticed with Minor White in the late 1960’s, I had adapted the ’series’ as a means of individualizing and adding depth to my exploration of my subjects.  In this searching for the essence of each story, I have reconciled each image to reflect my basic theme.  In my current work, ‘Another Face of Islam’, I have tried to reflect my artistic impression of the culture, landscape, and people of the Muslim world.  I have abandoned all pretense of photo-documentation and used my eye to capture the depth and serenity of the Islamic faith.  This work sprung out of a failed project I was pursuing that concentrated on the religions and cults of America.  Not only was this an over-tread path, it refused to inspire my vision. Given the current emotional charge and political landscape in America regarding terrorism and Islam, I found myself drawn to finding, if not the truth, at least my truth of this misunderstood religion. I have not sought to resolve any questions posed by our post 9/11 world, but rather to investigate the form, spirit and light of the Islamic faith and its influence on our world.

One aspect of the Muslim society I experienced as universal was a closed-door for a male photographer of women. Many aspects of their world are beyond the Western experience, but this single aspect of isolation and loneliness was all pervasive.  I have tried to convey this seperation and loneliness in my images.  The other all-present characteristic is the devout rigor and spiritual aura of each person and community I visited.  This translated not only in the loud speakers blaring their calls to prayer five times daily, but in conversations that alwasys presumed Islam is the only path, and if you are not on that path, you are completely misguided.  This self-conscious awareness of being on the wrong side of God’s gate was punctuated by countless details of everyday life. Examples of this awareness span from eating only with your right hand, to proscribed methods of toilet ritual.These small but persistent reminders of the rightness of their faith constantly pointed on one direction… Christianity, Judaism and all other belief systems are operating outside of the true intentiions of the truth, and therefore, God.  When you are not of their faith, ‘outsider’ takes on a whole new dimension.  I hope this isolation is conveyed in these images.

I have never thought of photography as a literal art form.  As a painter and graphic artist I have never distinguished a photograph from a painting in terms of interpretive value.  Once the image enters the eye of the artist and travels throught  the lens and ends on the paper, it is a transformation of almost magical dimensions.  I will never forget the first time I saw a silver print emerge in the printing solution.  I will never forget the first time I showed the image to another’s eyes.  This process of at least eight steps, creates an illusion as abstract and powerful as any art form.  Add to that, the transformation that takes place in the artist through the action, and the organic process never ends

In this exhibition the BMA presents more than 200 compelling and provocative images that showcase the work of more than 60 of the most remarkable photographers of our time.

The exhibition features groundbreaking individual photographs and photographic series by renowned artists such as Diane Arbus, William Eggleston, Lee Friedlander, and Cindy Sherman, as well as works by artists whose names are not as familiar as their influential images. Film and video installations by Kota Ezawa, Joan Jonas, and Anthony McCall demonstrate innovations in time-based media. The works in the exhibition are drawn from the BMA’s exceptional but rarely shown photography collection, and many of the images have never been on view until now.

The Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA) has a photography collection that has more than 4,000 works and is recognized to be among the top American museum photography collections.

Garry Winogrand. Centennial Ball, Metropolitan Museum, New York, from the series Women are Beautiful. 1969, printed 1981. The Baltimore Museum of Art: Gift of Stanley Kogan and Lynda Winston, Baltimore, BMA 1986.243.32. ©The Estate of Garry Winogrand, courtesy Fraenkel Gallery, San Francisco

Mickalene Thomas. Le déjeuner sur l’herbe: Les Trois Femmes Noires. 2010 The Baltimore Museum of Art: Collectors Circle Fund for Art by African Americans, and Roger M. Dalsheimer Photograph Acquisitions Endowment, BMA 2010.36. Courtesy of the Artist and Lehmann Maupin Gallery, New York

Seeing Now: Photography Since 1960
February 20, 2011 – May 15, 2011
Baltimore Museum of Art
Baltimore, MD