NYAB Event - Claiborne Swanson Frank "American Beauty"

Claiborne Swanson Frank "American Beauty"

Lu Magnus

This event has ended.

Lu Magnus presents American Beauty, the first full-scale solo show of works by photographer Claiborne Swanson Frank.
American Beauty features a selection of images that Swanson Frank took over the course of two years and consists of 20 of the 100 intimate portraits intended to individually and as a whole capture the quintessential spirit of the contemporary American woman. Over the course of the project Swanson Frank also found herself documenting the topography of the country itself – from unmanicured rambling fields to windswept beaches on both coasts, centuries-old barns, and even the graffiti covered sidewalks that make up the unique landscape of America.

Often inspired by John Singer Sargent’s formal compositions, Frank’s full-length portraits reference traditional portraiture, while incorporating a modern and free spirited sensibility and an incredible sense of vivid color. Her photographs offer a glimpse into a rarefied world where her subjects have surnames like Lauder, Bush, Getty, Hearst, DuPont and Kennedy but, as Vogue’s Photo Editor Ivan Shaw aptly points out in the book’s introduction, the contemporary art historical precedent began with Andy Warhol
advising young artists: “photograph your friends.” Over the years a legion of photographers have found their most profound subjects in those that were closest to them – Sally Mann’s children, Nan Goldin’s lovers and Tina Barney’s extended family, to name a few. Swanson Frank has already garnered comparison to the late Slim Aarons, whose photographs of the privileged at play defined an era.

Swanson Frank finds her own voice by injecting her work with something that is also intensely autobiographical. Shot without a crew, make-up artist, or a stylist and always shot in natural light, Swanson Frank subconsciously channels her own experience at Vogue, working under the tutelage of Anna Wintour, by making each portrait come to life in a realm that exists between the gritty and the ideal.