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Philip-Lorca diCorcia 
Fundación Telefónica and PhotoEspaña 2003 present an anthology of large formats from American photographer Philip-Lorca diCorcia, one of the innovators in street photography. He is recognized for re-focusing our view of everyday reality, and bringing it closer to the reality of artistic creation, through the combination of natural and artificial light in his portraits.
How do we look? contains three series, "Heads", "Streetwork" and "Family/Friends", and is composed of 40 large format photographs. The three series presented in the exhibit describe scenes of daily life in which human contact is unavoidable. They are typical scenes, familiar to us, and yet as viewers, we cannot draw our gaze away from them. Fundación Telefónica has acquired two pieces by this artist from his "Heads" series, photographs which are new additions to Telefónica’s Collection of Contemporary Photography. Many of the people photographed as portraits seem absent and isolated, reminding us of life in the city, with big city loneliness, and city-dwellers with their situations and personal dramas. According to critics, diCorcia’s photography blends fact and fiction, perfection and incompatibility, and melancholy and tension – all constants acting upon the viewer’s unconscious. Due to the cinematographic nature of his work and the focus on minute detail, taking a photo that he has in his mind can take several hours. Instead of choosing an image from among many, diCorcia’s method is just the opposite: he focuses his creative energy on doing a dozen or so master shots per year. After studying at Yale, diCorcia made a quick trip through the world of cinematography in Los Angeles and then returned to New York, where he found several jobs as assistant to professional photographers. It was here that he learned the techniques of publicity photography. Around 1984 he began his work as a freelance photographer for the magazines Fortune and Esquire, publications of Condé Nast. Five years later, the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) named diCorcia a participating artist and gave him a fellowship. Later, he would travel to Los Angeles with his assistant in search of locations for his photographs. During this period he frequented Santa Monica Boulevard, where he did portrait shots of people who lived on the edge, such as con-men, prostitutes and losers. In addition to the United States, he has exhibited in Milan, London, Hanover, and Paris, among other cities (see Annex). "STREETWORK" AND "HEADS" The exhibit is divided into three different photo series. Two of them, "Streetwork" and "Heads", from the subcategory of street photography (associated with Atget and Winogrand), show the absent looking expressions of the passers-by. Unlike diCorcia’s earlier series, these digitized images (done between 1999 and 2001) have nothing to do with fiction, or photographic tricks. In this series the artist is rescuing the passers-by from the New York streets, lighting the, with strategically hidden stroboscopic lights strategically hidden in the catwalks around Times Square. The lens of the artist shows the pedestrian being rescued from daily life and from the anonymity of the masses, to be placed on a dream stage. "FAMILY / FRIENDS" In "Family/Friends" we encounter the face of fiction that wants to insert itself into daily life. In this series the artist travels back and forth between the two functions of photography: that of leaving a record and that of creating. Towards the end of the seventies and throughout the eighties, diCorcia did portraits of his family and friends. Even though the reality of the portrait subjects’ existence seems documentary-like, unlike with "Heads" and "Streetwise", ultimately, these photos represent an elaborate stage design. In this sense, the characters familiar to diCorcia are acting out roles before the viewer, although the perfection of their acting and the banality of the location’s circumstances make us believe that it is an event out of real life. .
ANNEX Philip-Lorca diCorcia (1953, Hartford, Connecticut, U.S.A.) "Photography is a foreign language that everyone believes they can speak" Biographical notes: DiCorcia was educated at Yale. His approach to the world of photography is a cinematographic one. Before deciding to take the definitive shot he does painstaking analysis of the possibilities that the location and the people in it offer. In addition to his extreme care with detail, diCorcia is also known worldwide as one of the innovators in street photography, one who mixes artificial and natural light in a very selective way. Philip-Lorca diCorcia developed his keen interest in photography in the first classes he took at the University of Hartford at the beginning of the seventies. A few years later he entered the School of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, where he received his degree in 1975. After earning his master degree from this school one year later, he continued his studies at Yale, where he received a Master of Fine Arts degree in photography in 1979. His thesis dealt with two styles of photography: Hidden worlds versus closed worlds. After his experience at Yale, diCorcia continued taking photos, in search of a practical application and a job. After a brief trip through the world of the movie industry in Los Angeles, he returned to New York, where he found several jobs as assistant to professional photographers. Here he learned techniques of publicity photography. DiCorcia began his independent photographic work around 1984, as a freelancer for magazines Fortune and Esquire (Condé Nast publications). Five years later, the National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) admitted him as a participating artist and gave him a fellowship. At this time the NEA was under attack by critics for exhibiting the nudes of Robert Maplethorpe, and as a consequence, diCorcia had to sign a contract promising not to do any photographs which could be called obscene. Later he traveled to Los Angeles with his assistant in search of locations for his photos. It was during this period that he frequented Santa Monica Boulevard, where he did portraits of people living on the edge: con-men, prostitutes and losers. In addition to his native United States, from the beginning diCorcia chose Europe for his individual art shows. In recent years he has exhibited in Milan, Hanover, London, Paris, Brussels, and Cologne, among others. Education and Training: M.F.A.,1979 Yale University, New Haven, Graduate work, 1976 School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston B.A., 1975 School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston Selected List of Individual Exhibits: 2002 Monica De Cardenas, Milan, Italy Barbara Krakow, Boston, MA, USA 2001 Street, Gagosian Gallery, London, England 2000 Sprengel Museum, Hanover, Germany Lawing Gallery, Houston, TX., USA Street work, Galería OMR, Mexico City, Mexico 1999 PaceWildenstein Gallery, New York, USA Galerie Almine Rech, Paris, France Art Space Ginza, Tokyo, Japan 1998 Galerie Rodolphe Janssen, Brussels, Belgium Hustler/Streetwork, Reina Sofía National Museum of Art, Madrid, Spain Streetwork, Galerie Almine Rech, Paris, France Streetwork, PaceWildensteinMacGill, New York, USA 1997 Streetwork, Galerie Klemens Gasser und Tanja Grunert, Cologne, Germany Hollywood Pictures 1990-92, PaceWildenstein, Los Angeles, CA., USA 1996 Street Work, PaceWildensteinMacGill, New York, USA Theoretical Events, Naples, Italy Hollywood, Galerie Klemens Gasser, Cologne, Germany The Photographer’s Gallery, London, England 1995 Art & Public, Geneva, Switzerland Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Galerie Klemens Gasser, Cologne, Germany 1994 Portraits of America, Nikon Salon, Tokyo; Nikon Hall, Osaka, Japan 1993 Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Trade, Centre Culturel du Rocher, Lyon, France Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Photographs 1982-1992, Wooster Gardens, New York, USA Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Strangers, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA Strangers and Others, Galería Palmira Suso, Lisbon, Portugal 1991 Philip-Lorca diCorcia, The photographer’s Gallery, London, England 1985 Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Fotographie, Zeus Arts, Milan, Italy Selected List of Collective Exhibits: 2001-02 Settings and Players: Theatrical Ambiguity in American Photography, White Cube2, London, England Open City: Street Photographs since 1950, Museum of Modern Art, Oxford, UK; The Lowery, Salford Quays, Manchester, UK; Museum of Fine Arts of Bilbao, Bilbao, Spain; Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC Instant City, Pecci Museum, Prato, Italy 2000 Quotidiana, Castello di Rivoli, Italy The shape of the World/The end of the world, Comune di Milano, Italy Hybridity Photofestival, Arles, France; Photomuseum, Winterthur, Switzerland 1999 A frame of mind, Noorderlicht Photofestival, Groningen, Holland Museum of Contemporary Art, Miami, FL, USA 1998 Take the A Train, Howard Greenberg Gallery, New York, USA Icons, Galerie Fotohof Salzburg, Austria Rue Loiuse Weiss, Centre d’Art Contemporaine, Abbaye St Anré, Maymac, France Emotions and Relations, Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg Tell me a story: Narration in Contemporary Painting and photography, Centre National D’Art Contemporain de Grenoble, France Expander, Plate-forme d’exposition proposée par Bloc-Notes, Espace Gan Dia, Paris, France In the City, Exposition au FRAC Haute-Normandie, Rouen, France Situacionismo, un grupo de fotografía, Galería OMR, Mexico City, Mexico. 1997 Whitney Biennial Exhibition, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, USA Making it Real, Independent Curators Incorporated, Aldrich Museum of Contemporary Art, Ridgefield, CT, USA; Reykjavik Municipal Art Museum, Reykjavik, Iceland; Portland Museum of Art, Portland, OR, USA; Maine Bayly Art Museum, Charlottesville, USA; The Citibank Private Bank Photography Prize, Royal College of Art, London, England Tak y diCorcia, Gemente Museum, Helmond, Germany. Family and Friends, Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago, IL, USA 1996 Photos Leurres, Galerie Agnes B, Paris, France Pictures of Modern Life, France 1995 International Photo Triennial, Galerie dar Stadt Esslingen, Esslingen, Germany The Boston School, Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, Massachusetts, USA After Art: Rethinking 150 Years of Photography, Henry Art Gallery, University of Washington, Seattle; Ansel Adams Center, San Francisco; Portland Art Museum; Maine Alieu, Les Frontieres; Art & Public, Geneva; Galeries Photo, Montparnasse; y Crit-La Defense, Paris; Spain and France. 1994 Down Town, Netherlands Photo Institute, Rotterdam, Holland Present/Future, Jackson Fine Art, Atlanta, GA, USA Pictures of the Real World, Paula Cooper Gallery, New York, USA Flesh and Blood, Fotofeis, Edinburgh, Scotland; Ansel Adams Center for Photography, San Francisco; Foto Manifestabe, Eindhoven, Holland Photography by Nan Goldin and Philip-Lorca diCorcia, Robert Klein Gallery, Boston, MA, USA 1993 Family Matters, Northlinght Gallery, Arizona State University, USA Daydream Notion, Luhring Augustine Gallery, New York, USA Under Age: Photographs of Children, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA, USA Prospect 93, Frankfurter Kunstverein and Schirn Kunsthalle, Frankfurt, Germany 1992 Our Town, Burden Gallery, New York, USA The Sexual Self, Tanjia Grunert Gallery, Cologne, Germany Les Enfants Terribles, Wooster Gardens, New York, USA New Acquisitions/New Work/New Directions, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA, USA More than One Photography: Works since 1980 from the Collection, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA 1991 Pleasures and Terrors of Domestic Comfort, The Museum of Modern Art, New York; Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore; Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles; Contemporary Arts Center, Cincinnati, USA. Drawings, Prints and Photographs: A Summer Selection, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA Get Real, Art Gallery of York University, Toronto, Canada 1990 Witnesses: Against Our Vanishing, Artists Space, New York, USA Acceptable Entertainment, organized by Independent Curators Inc., New York. 1987 Arrangements for the Camera: A view of Contemporary Photography, Baltimore Museum of Art, Baltimore, MD, USA New Photography 2, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA 1985 Seduction: Working Photographs, White Columns, New York, USA Contemporary Photography VI, Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA Recent work by Twelve Photographers, Addison Gallery of American Art, Phillips Academy, Andover, MA, USA 1977 Contemporary Photography VI, Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, EUA Recent wok by twelve photographers, Addison Gallery of American Art, Phillips Academy, Andover, MA, USA Color’77-Seven contemporary photographers, Enjay Gallery of Photography, Boston, MA, USA Selected Awards and Distinctions: 1989 Artist Fellowship, National Endowment for The Arts 1987 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation Fellowship 1986 Artist Fellowship, National Endowment for The Arts 1980 Artist Fellowship, National Endowment for The Arts Public Collections (selected list): Addison Gallery of American Art, Andover, MA, USA Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, New York, USA Bertelsmann Music Group, New York, USA Benesta Corporation, Madrid, Spain Bibliotheque Nationale, Paris, France Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA, USA Chicago Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago, IL, USA Dreyfus Corporation, New York, USA Fogg Art Museum Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA Gallerie Civica di Modena, Modena, Italy Gemeente Museum, Helmond, Holland Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA., USA Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, USA Reina Sofía National Museum for Art, Madrid, Spain Museum of Fine Art, Houston, TX., USA Museum Folkwang, Essen, Germany Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, CA., USA Museum of Modern Art, New York, USA National French Foundation for Contemporary Art (FNAC) San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, CA., USA Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, USA Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT., USA Fundación Telefónica, Madrid, Spain. |
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ExhibitHow do we look?Opening Date: June 4, at 7:30 p.m Length of Exhibit: Fundación Telefónica, Tues. through Friday, 10 a.m.-2 p.m. and 5 p.m.– 8 p.m. |
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Office of Communications and Educational Programs Carmen Mañueco; phone: 91 5840424; Email:: carmen.manuecogrinda@telefonica.es David Felipe Arranz; phone: 91 5844827; Email:: david.arranzlago@telefonica.es FAX: 91 5323287 |
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