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RichardWasserman—Community Uprooted:
Eminent Domain in the U.S.
Chicago photographer Richard Wasserman explores the
impact of eminent domain on the lives of Americans across
the United States in
Community Uprooted
. Eminent domain
is the constitutional power of government to take private
property for the greater good of society. This process can
be used responsibly, but is also rife with possibilities for
misuse and corruption. Wasserman has partnered with the
Center for Urban Research and Learning at Loyola University
Chicago led by director Dr. Philip Nyden to transform this
photographic exploration into an interdisciplinary project
involving interviews with people in the affected areas and
in-depth historical research.
WilliamCastellana: SouthWilliamsburg
William Castellana is a nationally acclaimed photographer
who lives in South Williamsburg, Brooklyn. His closest
neighbors are Hasidim, Orthodox Jews of Eastern European
heritage. Through his photographs, we observe members
from this community striving to lead devout lives in the
midst of modern America. Men wear rekelech (wool coats),
women sheitels (wigs), and boys are conspicuous for their
pe’ot (sidecurls). In Castellana’s black and white images, the
Hasidim provide provocative counterpoints to contemporary
Brooklyn street life. Castellana’s work has proven controversial
because of his guerrilla approach to documenting life in South
Williamsburg. The exhibition will be accompanied by lectures
from Jewish scholars who will address the history of modern
European Jewry and the diversity of sects within contemporary
Judaism and their distinctive practices and beliefs.
WilliamUtermohlen: A Persistence of Memory
In 1995, WilliamUtermohlen was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s
disease. For the next seven years, he continued to make
art as the disease progressed and inexorably impaired his
ability to communicate verbally. Yet, by drawing upon the
involuntary memory developed over his 50 years as an artist,
Utermohlen continued to make meaningful images of himself
and his surroundings. To anyone unaware of the artist’s
condition, the work he produced in his final years could
easily be perceived as simply a new body of work leaning
increasingly towards abstraction. LUMA’s exhibition of over
100 works of art shows the impact of this debiliting disease
on the artist’s creative output. Research has revealed that
the part of the brain responsible for creativity is one of the
last to be effected by the disease, in spite of the earlier loss of
verbal communication. The visual and musical arts help to
increase attention span, improve self-esteem, and reduce the
feeling of isolation as the disease progresses. The exhibition
is held in conjunction with LUMA’s ilLUMAnations program
that uses art from the museum’s collections and exhibitions
to engage patients with early-onset Alzheimer’s as well as
their caregivers. The program is offered in partnership with
the Cognitive Neurology and Alzheimer’s Disease Center
at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine.
Established as a pilot program in 2013, LUMA now offers
9 sessions a year including music and dance, to engage
participants. All ilLUMAnations participants must be referred
by the Cognitive Neurology and Alzheimer’s Disease Center.
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Closing July 23
Images:
Celio Falls, Oregon
, Richard Wasserman;
Snow,
William Utermohlen