Weinstein Hammons Gallery

Weinstein Hammons Gallery is pleased to present Quarantine Diary, an exhibition of 18 new paintings by internationally renowned artist, Paolo Ventura. The exhibition will be on view by appointment starting July 10th. Originally based in Milan, Paolo Ventura found himself in Anghiari, Tuscany during the heat of the coronavirus pandemic to escape “the red zone”. Under serious lockdown restrictions and without his photographic equipment, Ventura started painting as a means of daily meditation. In contrast to Ventura’s previous work which draws inspiration from history, fiction and the imagined, Quarantine Diary is based on the details of everyday life and the present. The paintings in the exhibition include a portrait of his neighbor smoking a cigarette at her window, an effervescent vitamin c tablet dissolving in water, and a broken butterfly wing –– all reminders of the impermanence of this specific time. This exhibition, though an in-depth exploration of the artist's personal experience, speaks to the global experience of the quarantine and creates a collective permanent diary. Painted on brown wrapping paper with the artist’s limited supplies of acrylic paint, Ventura shows us the adaptability of art making. A book accompanying the exhibition Quarantine Diary is being published by Danilo Montanari Editore (Ravenna, 2020). Paolo Ventura studied at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Brera in Milan in the early 1990s. His work has been exhibited internationally, including at the Forma International Center for Photography, Milan; Museum of Contemporary Art of Roma (MACRO), Rome; The Hague Museum of Photography, The Hague; Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna, Rome and during the Rencontres de la Photographie, Arles. In 2012, he was selected to create a series of works for the Italian national pavilion at the 54th Venice Biennale; he also received a commission from the Museum of Contemporary Art of Rome. And recently Ventura was invited for a commission by the MART, the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art of Trento and Rovereto, Italy. Four monographs of Paolo Ventura's work have been published: War Souvenir (Contrasto, 2006), Winter Stories (Aperture and Contrasto, 2009), The Automaton (Peliti Asociati, 2011) and Lo Zuavo Scomparso (Punctum Press, 2012). A retrospective show of Ventura’s work Carousel is scheduled to open at CAMERA Centro Italiano per la Fotografia in September 2020.

There is something about both of us that goes deeper than blood or black and white. It is our common search for a better life, a better world. I march now over the same ground you once marched. I fight for the same things you fight for. My children’s needs are the same as your children’s. I too am America. America is me. It gave me the only life I know – so I must share in its survival. Look at me. Listen to me. Try to understand my struggle against your racism. There is yet a chance for us to live in peace beneath these restless skies. – Gordon Parks, 1968 Weinstein Hammons Gallery is pleased to present I Am You, an exhibition of 12 photographs by Gordon Parks. The gallery has been working with the Gordon Parks Foundation since 2012 and this will be the third exhibition of his photographs. I Am You will be on view by appointment starting Friday, July 10th. A preeminent photographer, poet, novelist, composer and filmmaker, Gordon Parks (1912-2006) was without a doubt one of the greatest American artists of the 20th century. Using his camera as a “weapon against poverty and racism,” Parks has left a remarkable body of work documenting American life for more than five decades. The I Am You portfolio was created in 2017 to bring together important Parks works relevant to the American Civil Rights Movement and social and racial injustice. Featuring an essay by Jelani Cobb, staff writer at the New Yorker magazine, photographs in the series include portraits of Rosa Parks, Jackie Robinson and his son, Mahalia Jackson singing at the 1963 March on Washington, and Malcolm X giving a speech in Harlem. Also included is an image of the crowd of 250,000 people gathered in front of the Lincoln Memorial listening to Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. deliver his historic “I Have a Dream” speech. While most of the photographs were taken almost 60 years ago, they are as relevant as ever. Parks' photography has been the subject of national and international exhibitions at numerous museums, including the Corcoran Gallery of Art, The Studio Museum in Harlem, Fondazione Forma per le Fotographia, High Museum of Art in Atlanta, New Orleans Museum of Art, Museum of Fine Arts Boston, Art institute of Chicago, and the Getty Museum. In 2019, the Museum of Modern Art acquired 55 new limited edition prints of Parks' work on the subject of crime. In recent events surrounding the death of George Floyd, Gordon Parks High School in St Paul, Minnesota was significantly damaged. In order to assist in the school's recovery, The Gordon Parks Foundation, SoulTouch Productions, and Weinstein Hammons Gallery will be donating 25% of the proceeds of the I Am You exhibition to the Gordon Parks legacy initiatives at the Gordon Parks High School. To make a separate or additional donation, please contact the Gordon Parks Foundation at info@mkfound.org. Image courtesy and copyright The Gordon Parks Foundation.