Bermudian Art

Photography of General Interest

ANDREWS, Meredith. (B. 1976 )

CCCP Diner. (2007)
Digital C-type print on Plexiglass.
Limited edition of 8 of which this is the Artist’s proof,
19.75 x 29.75 inches (50 x 75.5 cm)

General Coments

In post-Soviet Russia where there are enormous resources of energy and minerals, amid the entrenched class of oligarchs and the newly emerging, though still small middle-class of entrepreneurs, Andrews’ camera has caught the irony of the new capitalist culture which, in this image, janus-faced chronologically, stares at the viewer awkwardly, capturing as it does the power that CCCP once was - now humbled - but re-emerging phoenix-like from the ashes in the form of free-trade and Coca-Cola culture.

Biography

Award-winning photographer Meredith Andrews has shot for Editorial, Advertising, Corporate and Private Clients all over the world. After spending many years in Europe she’s currently based in Bermuda, her family home. Her photographs have been exhibited in many countries and can be seen in almost every media. She shoots a variety of reportage, life style and portrait photography.

Having completed her Master’s degree in Photography at Goldsmith’s College in London, England, Andrews initially lived and worked in London for several years.

She has worked for Nike, Digicel, Hewlett-Packard, The Independent, Amnesty International, The Bermuda Department of Tourism and Fortune Magazine. She has exhibited extensively throughout the world in both solo and group shows notably in the UK and Sweden as well as twice at The Bermuda National Gallery’s Biennial’s. She is currently working on a project in The Far East where she has already visited Vietnam and China.

McCURRY, Steve

Artist’s estate stamp on verso, also signed “Steve McCurry”. [Provenance: West coast U.S.A. Art market].

Biography

Steve McCurry, recognized universally as one of today's finest image makers, has won many of photography's top awards. Best known for his evocative color photography, McCurry, in the finest documentary tradition, captures the essence of human struggle and joy. Member of Magnum Photos since 1986, McCurry has searched and found the unforgettable; many of his images have become modern icons. Born in Philadelphia, McCurry graduated cum laude from the College of Arts and Architecture at the Pennsylvania State University. After working at a newspaper for two years, he left for India to freelance. It was in India that McCurry learned to watch and wait on life. "If you wait," he realized, "people would forget your camera and the soul would drift up into view." His career was launched when, disguised in native garb, he crossed the Pakistan border into rebel-controlled Afghanistan just before the Russian invasion. When he emerged, he had rolls of film sewn into his clothes, images which would be published around the world as among the first to show the conflict there. His coverage won the Robert Capa Gold Medal for Best Photographic Reporting from Abroad, an award dedicated to photographers exhibiting exceptional courage and enterprise. He is the recipient of numerous awards which include Magazine Photographer of the Year, awarded by the National Press Photographers Association. This was the same year in which he won an unprecedented four first prizes in the World Press Photo Contest. He has won the Olivier Rebbot Memorial Award twice.Steve McCurry has covered many areas of international and civil conflict, including the Iran-Iraq war, Beirut, Cambodia, the Philippines, the Gulf War, and continuing coverage of Afghanistan. McCurry's work has been featured in every major magazine in the world and frequently appears in National Geographic magazine with recent articles on Tibet, Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, and the temples of Angkor Wat, Cambodia. McCurry is driven by an innate curiosity and sense of wonder about the world and everyone in it. He has an uncanny ability to cross boundaries of language and culture to capture stories of human experience. "Most of my images are grounded in people, and I try to convey what it is like to be that person, a person caught in a broader landscape, that you could call the human condition."A high point of his career was the rediscovery of the previously unidentified Afghan refugee girl which many have described as the most recognizable photograph in the world today. When he finally located Sharbat Gula after almost two decades, he said, “Her skin is weathered; there are wrinkles now, but she is as striking as she was all those years ago.”McCurry returned from an extended assignment in China on September 10, 2001. His coverage of the rubble at Ground Zero on September 11, is a testament to the heroism and nobility of the people of New York City. He said, ”You felt the horror and immediately, instinctively understood that our lives would never be the same again.”

MEINEL, Javier Silva, Peruvian, (1949- ) Palometas, Iquitos, Peru, 7/25 edition, 2003.

Gelatin Silver Print

14 1/2 x 14 1/2 inches (image size) 20x16 inches (paper size). (106303c-C)

Background

This black-and-white “portraiture-style” photo, with its dramatic pose and mysterious prop, forms just one part of a body of work which explores the people of the rainforests of the Amazonian Basin where native communities still follow an ancient vision and adhere to customs and traditions that defy the parameters of our western world view.

As a restless spirit and indefatigable traveller, Silva has journeyed down the intricate roads of his country to remote areas, always opting to concentrate on the inhabitants of those unchartered lands giving us a sense of the ungraspable face of the Amazon.

Tom Hinson, Curator of Photography at The Cleveland Museum of Art, said of a body of Meinel’s work in 2001, two years before this image was taken:

“These are compelling, timeless portraits that rise beyond exoticism and embody the spirituality and cultural richness of Peru’s indigenous people. He transforms them into spiritual and cultural icons.” – clearly these comments are rightly echoed two years later in this work by the artist.

Biography

Javier Silva Meinel, born in 1949 in Lima, Peru started working as a photographer in 1973. He was one of the founding members of Secuencia Fotogaleria and received a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1990 for his work about Andean ritual practices featured in Il Libro de los Encantados (1993). He published the book Acho, altar de arena (1993), about bullfighting backstage of Lima. He has had solo shows in New York and Europe, Secuencia Fotogaleria in Lima, Centro Cultural de la Municipalidad de Mira flores, as well as group exhibitions including “A Spiritual Journey” at the Brooklyn Museum of Art (1996), and “The Peruvians” at Fotofest, Houston (1990), and at The Cleveland Museum of Art (2001) as well as all over the world. Mr. Silva lives and works as a photographer in Lima