On October 28th Foley Gallery opens an exhibition of over 30 black & white photographs by American Photographer Rosalind Fox Solomon. The Forgotten draws from her extensive portfolio of work from 1976 – 2019. The show will coincide with the release of her MACK book, The Forgotten. Signed copies of the book will be available during the reception.
Pictures from The Forgotten introduce us to people who are chained to events in history that have permanently affected how they live. These events can never be forgotten. They often register on the body. They act as a reminder of incidents that others would like to forget.
A scene from Cambodia, presents two teenage girls smiling for the camera, though each has lost a leg to a landmine. A photograph made a generation after the war in Vietnam, shows the genetic effects of Agent Orange. A young man in New York reflects the tragedy of the AIDS epidemic.
The body is not the only recorder of life. The space in which these stories play out tells us something about Fox Solomon’s subjects. In a school in rural Guatemala, young children pretend to make music with paper instruments. A photograph from Tennessee presents an older woman seated on her stairs, mouth open, body blocked by rails, surrounded by an army of dolls.
Each Fox Solomon photograph is a story of a life waiting to be discovered. Wherever she finds herself in the world, she finds individuals willing to share themselves with the camera, and ultimately to us. What allows us to look deeply into Fox Solomon's photographs is her compassionate point of view on subjects that might typically persuade us to look away, trying to forget what's right before our eyes.
Rosalind Fox Solomon (b. 1930) is an American artist based in New York City, celebrated for her portraits related to struggle and survival. Fox Solomon's work flows back and forth between the personal and the universal.
For the past 45 years, Fox Solomon has created challenging bodies of work, shown in nearly 30 solo exhibitions and 100 group exhibitions and in the collections of over 50 museums worldwide, including the Museum of Modern Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the National Gallery of Art, the Center for Creative Photography, the Bibliotheque Nationale de France and the Victoria and Albert Museum. Her publications include Chapalingas (STEIDL, 2003), Polish Shadow STEIDL, 2006), Them (MACK, 2014), Got To Go (MACK, 2016), Liberty Theater (MACK, 2018).
Rosalind Fox Solomon's The Forgotten is on view from October 28 – December 5, 2021. Foley Gallery is open Wednesday through Saturday, 11 – 5:30 pm, and Sunday, 12 - 5. To request images, please contact the gallery at hello@foleygallery.com.