Henry Art Gallery’s “Shadows of a Fleeting World” Exhibit is Must-See Photography

by RVO on April 6, 2011

Early versions of the camera, a contraption that captures and records both image and light, have been around since the 6th century and the first photograph was taken in 1817. But it wasn’t until the late nineteenth century, about the time George Eastman perfected photographic film and started producing cameras for sale, that photography started to capture the attention of the public, and specifically artists.

The camera’s main feature in the early days was its ability to exactly record the world as it existed at any given moment. By 1900, artists began adding commentary to photographs through the selection of subject matter, extending or shortening exposure times, or generally goofing with the images.

By 1914, artists were pushing the limits of photography and it became, momentarily, the hot art form of the early twentieth century.

“Shadows of a Fleeting World: Pictorial Photography and the Seattle Camera Club,” an exhibition of photographs now at the Henry Art Gallery (through May 8, 2011), captures the moment when Seattle artists discovered the joy of goofing with the camera. And what a moment it was.

“Fleeting World” is, hands down, the finest art exhibit to hit Seattle this year.

The exhibit features the work of the seven-member Seattle Camera Club. Formed in 1924, the club featured various members at various times, but was basically the realm of Wayne Albee, Virna Haffer, Dr. Kyo Koike, Frank Asakichi Kunishige, Ella McBride, Yukio Morinaga, and Soichi Sunami.

The inclusion of Japanese Americans in the club, noteworthy as it is, was not necessarily unusual for Seattle, which has always had a large Asian population and has always had close ties with Japan. But the influence of Japanese sensitivities heightens the beauty of the show.

There is a carefree, introspective spirit to these photographs. Curator Elizabeth Brown has roughly broken the four-room exhibition down along subject matter lines.

There is a section of mostly flowers which are breathtaking; natural scenes of mountains and lakes which are mystical and lovely; street scenes which capture the hustle of life on Seattle’s turn of the century streets; and, best of all, a section of stunning portraits of the artists’ friends or, even better, famous dancers and performers that came through town. Sunami’s portrait of Martha Graham might be the best photograph ever taken of the great dancer.

Many of the nature and street scenes are filtered through a haze, a soft glow that softens them a little, but this is not a nostalgic show. These images are alive and all the more remarkable considering the huge cameras needed to take these images. There is a small photo of Sunami with his portrait camera and it’s astonishing that he could have used that machine to take such delicate photos. Try dragging that camera up the side of Mount Rainier or through city streets or into a forest; the Seattle Camera Club members did, and it’s to our benefit that their photos have survived.

Part of the reason this exhibit delights is because it’s a labor of love. The hero of “Fleeting World” is David F. Martin, the co-owner of Martin-Zambito Fine Arts, who has been on a long, three-decade quest to mine the early artists that lived in Seattle and the surrounding area. Martin, who wrote a magnificent essay for the catalog, helped locate and select the images for the exhibit, and wrote the bios of all the artists, has spent years researching the Seattle Camera Club’s history and he has written about it and organized small shows in the past.

Give Brown and the Henry Gallery credit for finally stepping up with an exhibition for the ages, and a catalog that belongs on the shelf of anyone who cares about art, Seattle, or the courage and daring of artists with the talents of the Seattle Camera Club.

Walking through the galleries, you get an overwhelming sense of being in the hands of masters. Subject matter is handled with grace, gentile irony and an astonishing sense of scale. Mount Rainier is photographed in all its grandeur, a man is shown tiny against a huge background of arena seats, dancers are caught mid-jumps, and Seattle’s waterfront is shown as a crowded, busy hub of activity.

Some of the artists, Virna Haffer in particular, really had fun with some images using double, triple exposures, strange distortions and other groundbreaking techniques.

Though the exhibition does not get weighed down in nostalgia, there is one wistful irony. The Japanese American artists, who so clearly had a love for their country, its cities and nature, were soon to be disenfranchised from their beloved environs and shipped off to interment camps during World War II.

They live on in this exhibition. Here they are, in their glorious prime taking photos of beauty and grace. Right before the world turned forever ugly. Go honor them by seeing their work. Trust me, you won’t forget it.

Filed under Arts & Entertainment, ARTS_FEATURED, Visual Arts
  • Betsey

    We can’t forget the other heroes of this exhibition! Most of the works on view are part of the University of Washington’s Libraries’ Special Collections (http://www.lib.washington.edu/specialcoll/) and the accompanying publication was created with University of Washington Press (http://www.washington.edu/uwpress/search/books/MARSHA.html).

  • RVO

    Well said, Betsy. The UW has been the safe repository of many of these fantastic photographs for years. And they are just a few of the great collections that can be viewed with a reservation. The UW has been a great steward of fantastic collections and they have pulled many of this exhibit’s works from the library. Thank you, UW.

  • http://hankblog.wordpress.com/2011/04/06/aw-thanks-sunbreak/ Aw, Thanks SunBreak! « Hankblog

    [...] Aw, Thanks SunBreak! Henry Art Gallery’s “Shadows of a Fleeting World” Exhibit is Must-See Photography… [...]

  • Joyce

    Thanks RVO! The Libraries established this project in collaboration with David Martin, the Press and the Henry Gallery to draw attention to the need for support to preserve the Seattle Camera Club materials. We have been working on this project for seven years. We are delighted with the popularity of the exhibition and the book by co-authors Martin and Nicolette Bromberg, Visual Materials Curator. This project demonstrates the important role Special Collections plays in preserving materials, which reflect the diversity of our community, and the value of community and University campus partnerships. Two more real heroes of the story are Iwao Matsushita, who saved the collections and donated them to the Libraries, and Robert Monroe, who accepted these materials into Special Collections in the 1970s.

  • David

    I just want to post on this site that the UW Library Special Collections needs funds to help preserve this exceptional collection. The community should get behind this as it is just as important as the exhibit and the book.

  • Nicolette

    I would like to point two things: 1. Since the club was started by Japanese Americans, it was the inclusion of others that is notable (not the inclusion of Japanese Americans). Many of the other Japanese camera clubs up and down the west coast only had Japanese members. Through Dr. Koike, the club put their welcome out to the rest of the Seattle photographic community. 2. Although David decided to feature six of the camera club members (plus Wayne Albee who was not), those six were in no way the only people who were the heart of the club. There was a dedicated group of people who were active members through out the years of the club (Verna Haffer was only in it for about 6 months). And other members such as Hideo Onishi, Fred Ogasawara, Hiromu Kira and others were highly successful. The heart of the club were the members who attended meetings, participated in their outings and contributed to their activities. (This by the way, includes Charles Musgrave, who exhibited, attended meetings and activities and even served as an officer of the club. Unfortunately none of his work seems to have survived.) Part of the point of my essay in the book was to give a voice to the club members–all of them.

  • InfoDavid

    I wanted to clarify a few things. There are a few other photographers discussed in my essay because they were very important to Northwest Pictorialism. The book and exhibit is not exclusively about the Seattle Camera Club but features them heavily. The earlier Frederick & Nelson Salons in which most SCC members exhibited, were very important too and led up to the founding of the SCC.
    I wish that I could have found more information and work by members like Onishi and especially Ogasawara whose work is superb. I am hoping that more of their work and biographical information will surface.
    I also found no evidence that Wayne Albee was not a member of the SCC. He was extremely important to the SCC as mentor to most of the members and promoted them in local and national publications. Even some of the important members only exhibited a few works in the SCC salons, like Iwao Matsushita who only exhibited four prints during the existence of the club.
    Regarding Virna Haffer, she exhibited with the SCC in 1928 and was a member until it disbanded in 1929 but was also in their last exhibit at the Seattle Art Institute in 1930.

  • RVO

    Thank you, Nicolette. I used Mr. Martin’s earlier show at the Seattle Art Museum and his accompanying article in American Art Review to further my understanding of the Henry show and the SCC. What I really wanted to get out there was that, to my eyes, this isn’t so much an exhibition of Japanese American art or non-Japanese American art. It is simply a distinctly American art, and distinctly Northwest: planes, Mt. Rainier, Mt. Baker, Pioneer Square, Coleman Dock, local celebrities and friends. Now, these works are no doubt informed by heritage, tradition and memory, but what is so alive in them is a love for the climate, nature and culture of Seattle. Ms. Brown’s inclusion of the correspondence and Christmas cards was a masterstroke. As I said, it’s the finest exhibition I’ve seen around here in a long time. If I have one sorrow it’s that there is not, in the labels or the wonderful book, a section on how these photos were taken; it was, after all, a camera club. What cameras did they use? What kind of film, exposure times, focal lengths did they use? Were any new technologies created by the club? What techniques were used? Also, I’d love to know more about how the UW ended up with this wonderful collection. Was it actively pursued or passively accepted? These are delicate works, sensitive, ironically, to light. What special care is taken in their storage? How are they stored? (I remember years ago a great exhibit of the Harvard Rothko Murals was really about conservation-the murals have faded badly). But this is a minor flaw in an otherwise landmark exhibit. The Henry is to be congratulated, Ms. Brown has curated the show magnificently, using the best UW and community sources, and UW press has created a book I just can’t put down. More work needs to be done for other local artists who challenged norms, created breathtaking work and left lasting legacies.