Washington City Paper Art Review of "SEEN BETTER TIMES" by Louis Jacobson

©Tom Sliter, “Time’s Up”

Ongoing: “Seen Better Times” at Multiple Exposures Gallery

Don’t waste my time with ruin porn, writes Michael Borek in his juror statement for the
exhibition Seen Better Times at Multiple Exposures Gallery. Photographing peeling walls and
decay eventually becomes “a bit boring, because there is nothing more behind the surface,”
Borek writes. Nonetheless, some of the images Borek selected do dabble in tumbledown scenery,
including Eric Johnson’s photograph of the exterior of a run-down theater, Sarah Hood
Salomon
’s image of a building being gutted, Sandy LeBrun–Evans’ Cuban streetscape
featuring a broken-down jalopy and a young child, and Matt Leedham’s photograph of a broken
TV deposited by an elevator in a run-down apartment building. A few other contributors take the
riskier approach of applying the theme of decline to people, including a Maureen Minehan
image of two men standing on opposite corners of an urban intersection and Fred Zafran’s
photograph of two men of a certain age conversing street-side. But the exhibit’s most notable
works are those that veer in a different direction. Two contributors succeed through abstraction:
Alan Sislen with a door that has devolved into multiple layers of fading paint and Francine B.
Livaditis
with a constructivist assemblage of boldly hued pieces of metal in a boneyard.
Meanwhile, an image by Zafran offers a tableau worthy of Gregory Crewdson, in which a man
in an old-timey diner wipes his mouth as a waitress behind the counter stares into the unseen
distance. A thematic counterpoint, though, is Soomin Ham’s understated black-and-white image
of a ladder leaning against a wall and rising into a tree-ringed sky. If the rest of the exhibit dwells
on deterioration, Ham’s photograph seems to offer a literal escape. Seen Better Times runs
through April 7 at Multiple Exposures Gallery at the Torpedo Factory Art Center, 105 N. Union
St., Alexandria. Daily, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. multipleexposuresgallery.com. Free. —
Louis Jacobson

SEEN BETTER TIMES, a new fine art photography exhibition juried by Michael Borek

Pacific Theater ©Eric Johnson

Multiple Exposures Gallery (MEG) is pleased to announce SEEN BETTER TIMES, a new fine art photography exhibition juried by Michael Borek. 

On display at MEG through April 7, the exhibition features 24 images that depict scenes that have "seen better days." Juror Michael Borek says the images he chose from the 14 included photographers go behind the surface of obvious decay and "invite viewers to use their imaginations to finish the hint of a story that is sketched out, but unfinished." 

Exhibition Artists: Soomin Ham, Eric Johnson, Irina Lawton, Sandy LeBrun-Evans, Matt Leedham, Francine B. Livaditis, Maureen Minehan, David Myers, Van Pulley, Sarah Hood Salomon, Alan Sislen, Tom Sliter and Fred Zafran

Exhibition days: March 12 - April 07, 2024
Exhibition hours: 11am-5pm daily
Location: Multiple Exposures Gallery | Torpedo Factory Art Center | #312


Contact Information For Media & Purchase Inquiries
High resolution images for media use are available upon request. All images are available for purchase through the gallery. 

Multiple Exposures Gallery
The Torpedo Factory Art Center
105 N Union Street, Studio 312
Alexandria, Virginia  22314
Phone: 703.683.2205
Email
Website

Say Hello to David Myers + Stacy Smith Evans

Please join us in welcoming David Myers and Stacy Smith Evans to Multiple Exposures Gallery (MEG). David and Stacy each rose to the top after a rigorous selection process, and we could not be happier to add these two terrific fine art photographers to our gallery. 

David comes to us with a wealth of experience as a fine art photographer. He has studied photography at the San Francisco Art Institute with Imogen Cunningham, among others, and in workshops with Ernesto Bazan, Jeff Jacobson, Raymond Meeks, Adriana Ault, Tim Carpenter, Gregory Halpern, Frederico Clavarino, and Brad Feuerhelm. He describes his primary subject matter as “the ordinary in the context of the landscape, rural life, and urban environments.”

David’s work often results from longer-term efforts where he returns many times to the same, similar or related locations. Sometimes, he says, he starts with an agenda or preconception of what he wants to photograph, while other times he starts with a clean slate. “In the end, the final product rarely aligns with what I imagined when I first go out; the work develops/evolves while engaging with a place or context in which I am operating.” 

Images from David can be viewed in-person at MEG, along with his recently published art book, Almost Heroic. Almost Heroic and several other publications from David will also be available at the Capital Art Book Fair, April 6-7, at Eastern Market in Washington, DC. Look for the MEG banner to find our tables. You can also see two of David’s portfolios on the MEG website

David Myers

Stacy, a successful commercial photographer who creates joyful, timeless portraits, is bringing a different side of her photographic work with her to MEG. Stacy has a keen eye for and deep interest in landscape photography, and her images reflect her connection to nature and the land that has shaped her.  “As seasons change, I revisit nearby rivers, mountains, and forests. The familiar features are comforting both in memories and in the present. I read the changing landscape, noting what once was and what might be in years ahead. I photograph the water’s ripples, the blue ridges, and tree-lined paths, new each time,” she says.

 “I often photograph in the morning hours when softer tones and lingering fog lend a dream-like quality to my images reminiscent of memories. I hope my work evokes a sense of calm and appreciation for our natural and nearby world.”  

Stacy’s images are now available for viewing in-person at MEG and on the MEG website. The gallery is open daily from 11am-5pm. You can find us at the Torpedo Factory Art Center, 105 North Union Street, Alexandria, VA. 

Stacy Smith Evans

Interested in joining MEG? When we have an opening for a new artist, we issue a membership call and invite interested photographers to apply for consideration. If you’d like to be notified of a future membership call, please complete the form on our Membership Interest page, and we’ll add you to our call list.

Show Ready: An Interview with Maureen Minehan

Each year at MEG, we host five solo exhibitions and five juried group exhibitions. For solo exhibitions, the artist is in complete control of the show theme and the number and presentation format for the images.

Some artists go big, with fewer images, but larger sizes, while others have done the opposite, opting for a greater number of smaller-scale images. Similarly, some artists choose traditional gallery framing, while others present their work on metal, in book form, as encaustics, or through other art mediums. Regardless each exhibition shares an important characteristic — the images included are a cohesive body of work that represents the photographer’s artistic style and vision.

The next solo exhibition at MEG, on display April 9 - May 17, will be a show by Maureen Minehan, and we caught up with her mid-preparation to ask her a few questions about producing an exhibition: 

You’re a month away from your show’s opening date? Are you ready? 

I’m not sure you’re ever completely ready for your exhibition. In my experience, artists tend to be perfectionists who are considering their work up until the moment it’s hung to determine if something needs to be added or changed. After the work is on the walls, sometimes you have to hold yourself back from tweaking things that only you see. It’s part of what keeps us making art – it’s a constant quest to do more, add more, grow more. 

Currently, I’d say I’m about halfway through my exhibition preparations.  I’ve selected my images and determined the layout and presentation for the show, and I’m about to move into printing, matting and framing, which should take 7-10 days. If everything stays in, I’ll have 23 images in total. 

How do you choose what to include and what to leave out? 

To me, this is always the biggest challenge. I often have images I love, but they don’t really work with the overall theme for the exhibition, whether because of color or composition or subject matter. It can be hard to let them go, but I’ve learned to set them aside and if I really love them enough, consider building a different exhibition or portfolio around them in the future. Conversely, I’ve also had to learn how to reject images that fit with the show’s flow or theme, but aren’t great images. Your exhibition is only as good as its weakest image. In the end, I look for images that are cohesive as a group, but also have the strength to stand solely on their own. 

Besides preparation of your images, what other work goes into exhibition preparation?

A big one is determining the layout for the exhibition and sequencing of images. Fortunately, at MEG, we’re lucky to have Tom Sliter as an in-house expert on exhibition hanging, and he is able to provide useful suggestions to make the layout interesting and comprehensible at the same time. Exhibiting artists also need to prepare an artist statement that provides context for the work shown and begin reaching out to the broader community to invite them to the exhibition. Outreach through direct contact, social media and regional art publications are all important. We’re also fortunate that local art critics such as Mark Jenkins with the Washington Post and Lou Jacobson with the Washington City Paper often take time to visit our exhibitions and publish reviews of MEG shows, expanding our potential audience.

Are you ready to share your show title? 

Not yet. I’m torn between two possibilities (see my earlier answer about perfectionism!). Deadline pressure will eventually force me to make a choice though so stay tuned. 

Any advice for others in preparing exhibitions? 

  1. Start early. Everything will take longer than you think.

  2. Go big and scale down. It’s easier to toss images out than add them in so start with more images than you know you’ll want and play with different configurations. 

  3. Be ruthless. Once you’re ready to scale down, be ruthless in rooting out weaker images or those that don’t fit the context of the exhibition. 

  4. Use work prints. Don’t rely on images on a screen to select your show. Produce small work prints that you can tape on a wall and/or lay out on a desk or the floor and move them around. What looks great on a screen doesn’t always translate to great on a wall so start using physical prints early in the process. 

  5. Ask for feedback. Check in with a few people whose photographic eyes you respect and ask for feedback on your choices. You might not change a thing, but it’s helpful to have fresh perspectives to consider before finalizing your selections. 

Art Collecting: What Visitors Are Buying

All of the work displayed at MEG is available for purchase, and we are always delighted when a gallery visitor finds an image that resonates with them. When we reviewed recent sales, we looked for patterns to see if any trends emerged and found that like all good art, individuals choose to invest in it when it speaks to their hearts. Here are two images from Fred Zafran that recently spoke to a visitor who purchased them from Fred’s Far Winter Field portfolio.

Fred Zafran

Fred Zafran

Washington City Paper Art Review of Soomin Ham's "RECOLLECTIONS" by Louis Jacobson

Soomin Ham’s “Song of the Butterfly”

Bratty and Soomin Ham’s Photos: City Lights for Feb. 29–March 7

In her photography, Soomin Ham returns often to deeply personal imagery. In Recollections, her most recent solo exhibition at Multiple Exposures Gallery, Ham does so again, including repurposing works from a previous exhibit, Sound of Butterfly, in which she photographed her late mother’s possessions using stunningly creative techniques such as encasing the images in ice or leaving them out to be covered by falling snow. Recollections doesn’t have the same intense focus on grief; it’s more about her journey through “fragments and layers that shape a landscape of dreams, losses, and memories.” A major recurring theme in her current show is the contrast between light and dark; “Lights for the Fallen” pairs a washed-out portrayal of tombstones with an inky sky filled with twinkling stars, while the vertical diptych “East” and “West” twins portrayals of upside-down and right-side-up branches. Ham includes five images from her “Windows” series, notably a soft-toned stack of clouds hovering over a thin strip of land and a peaceful, pictorialist depiction of a family of ducks on the surface of a lake. Ham’s most enigmatic image may be “Once Upon a Time,” in which a series of footprint-like impressions recedes into the distance in the sand—or are they actually ascending into the sky? With Ham at her moodiest, it’s hard to be sure. Recollections runs through March 10 at Multiple Exposures Gallery at the Torpedo Factory Art Center, 105 N. Union St., Alexandria. Daily, 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. multipleexposuresgallery.com. Free. —Louis Jacobson

RECOLLECTIONS, a New Solo Exhibition by Soomin Ham

“Wonder", Window series by Soomin Ham

Multiple Exposures Gallery is pleased to present RECOLLECTIONS, an exhibition by Soomin Ham that explores the landscape of memories, loss, and dreams through photography. Ham delves into moments and places that have defined her life and uses photographic imagery to reflect on their meaning. Ham’s photo essay goes beyond her self-discovery—her work invites viewers to contemplate the fragments and layers that have shaped their own stories too. (Read Ham’s full statement here)

An opening reception will be held on Sunday, February 11, 2024, from 2pm-4pm.

About the artist

Soomin Ham is a photographer and multimedia artist based in the Washington D.C. area. Her work includes photography, mixed media, and multimedia installations, and it has been exhibited widely throughout the DC area, New York City, and Seoul, Korea. Ham is the recipient of D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities grants, including an Individual Artists Fellowship Grant and Small Projects Grant, and she also has received a Visual Arts Fellowship from the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts.

Website:  www.soominham.com | Instagram: @soominhamartstudio | Email: soominham@gmail.com


Exhibition days: January 30 - March 10, 2024
Exhibition hours: 11am-5pm daily
Location: Multiple Exposures Gallery | Torpedo Factory Art Center | #312


Contact Information For Media & Purchase Inquiries
High resolution images for media use are available upon request. All images are available for purchase through the gallery.  

WINTER, MEG Juried Show : Washington Post Art Review by Mark Jenkins

”Jones Point” by Eric Johnson

WINTER

About a third of the photographs in “Winter” are in color, but that’s not always immediately obvious. The Multiple Exposures Gallery group show depicts a whited-out world, where most details are buried under snow: Four clustered plastic flamingos offer just a hint of pink in Tom Sliter’s lawn scene, and a remote yellow shed provides the only color in Maureen Minehan’s landscape.

The gallery is known for devising story-less narratives, arranging photos purely by visual affinities. “Winter” takes a similar approach, shifting from mountain to mountain and tree to tree. One striking pair juxtaposes views of jagged dark gashes through whiteness: a fence in Alan Sislen’s picture and a stream in Fred Zafran’s.

A winter storm can transform an everyday object, such as the snow-blasted door Eric Johnson found just a few blocks from the gallery. It can also nearly obliterate a vista, like the one Soomin Ham renders in white and light gray with just a few black shapes, apparently birds, in the middle distance. In both pictures a coating of white occasions new ways of seeing.

Winter Through Jan. 28 at Multiple Exposures Gallery, Torpedo Factory, 105 N. Union St., Alexandria. multipleexposuresgallery.com. 703-683-2205.

Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainme...

WINTER: MEG New Exhibition Juried by Tim Anderson

Punta Bariloche © Van Pulley

Multiple Exposures Gallery (MEG) is pleased to announce WINTER, a new fine art photography exhibition juried by Tim Anderson, publisher and editor of acclaimed photography magazine, Shadow & Light. 

On display at MEG through January 28, 2024, the exhibition features 24 images that reflect the beauty and complexities of winter. "Upon first viewing, I almost felt an icy shudder course through my body," juror Tim Anderson says. "The challenge was not to select those that would be in the gallery show, it was which ones to not include. All are worthy." [READ MORE]

Exhibition Artists: Soomin Ham, Eric Johnson, Clara Young Kim, Irina Lawton, Sandy LeBrun-Evans, Matt Leedham, Francine B. Livaditis, Maureen Minehan, Van Pulley, Sarah Hood Salomon, Alan Sislen, Tom Sliter and Fred Zafran

View the Exhibition: WINTER

Exhibition hours: 11am-5pm daily
Location: Multiple Exposures Gallery | Torpedo Factory Art Center | #312

Contact Information For Media & Purchase Inquiries
High resolution images for media use are available upon request. All images are available for purchase through the gallery.