PEOPLE WATCHING: CONTEMPORARY PHOTOGRAPHY SINCE 1965
Bowdoin College Museum of Art, 2023
Through more than 120 photographs by more than four dozen leading contemporary artists, the exhibition explores the phenomenon of “people watching” as a recreational activity, an act of surveillance, a type of harassment, a sign of empathy, and a documentary form of expression.
Since the advent of photography in the nineteenth century, artists have used the camera to look at—and to look with—the human subjects in their midst. They have made a practice centered on the figure one of the medium’s leading genres. This interest in bodies in public and private space has only increased in recent decades with the development of new camera technologies and distribution systems. “People watching” is about noticing difference, but also about attempts to find common ground, an idea that is especially poignant at this historic moment.
Read the press release here.
Bowdoin College Museum of Art, 2023
Through more than 120 photographs by more than four dozen leading contemporary artists, the exhibition explores the phenomenon of “people watching” as a recreational activity, an act of surveillance, a type of harassment, a sign of empathy, and a documentary form of expression.
Since the advent of photography in the nineteenth century, artists have used the camera to look at—and to look with—the human subjects in their midst. They have made a practice centered on the figure one of the medium’s leading genres. This interest in bodies in public and private space has only increased in recent decades with the development of new camera technologies and distribution systems. “People watching” is about noticing difference, but also about attempts to find common ground, an idea that is especially poignant at this historic moment.
Read the press release here.
