NYAB Event - Paul Cary Goldberg “A Photographic Exhibition of Community Life in Gloucester, Massachusetts”

Paul Cary Goldberg “A Photographic Exhibition of Community Life in Gloucester, Massachusetts”

Queens College Art Center

This event has ended.

Italian Americans, mostly from Sicily, make up about a quarter of the population of Gloucester, Massachusetts—the oldest fishing port in the United States. Many Sicilians arrived from Trapani during the great wave of Italian immigration, and more immigrated after World War II, especially from Terrasini (Palermo province). Immigrants Paolo and Anna Ciaramitaro opened Caffé Sicilia in the West End of Gloucester in 1989. In 2009, Maria Cracchiolo and her mother, Nina D’Amico, also Sicilian Americans, became the new owners. Of modest dimensions, the café is a cozy community gathering place for Italian Americans and their fellow citizens and friends, including photographer Paul Cary Goldberg, who began photographing there in spring 2007 and soon became part of the café’s morning routine. The photographs in this exhibition are intimate images—candid portraits of his Sicilian-American neighbors and their everyday lives. They also speak to the recent experiences of Gloucester’s fishermen, who, with the fishing industry in a beleaguered state, have found work in other sectors and have become activists in matters of fishermen’s rights, fishing regulations, and city governance.