Medicine Agency is proud to present the first official exhibition of photographs by San Francisco based photographer Sean Desmond. The show will feature a collection of 35 photographs from Desmond’s ongoing Tenderloin Project, a portrait in film and photography of San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood. To many, the Tenderloin is a poor and stigmatized area, to be avoided if possible, rushed through if necessary. As a point of departure, Desmond and the Tenderloin Project withstand such stereotypes and enter the neighborhood with eyes open and active intent.
The images that emerge transcend a mere documentation of what we could all see if we only looked. We witness the Tenderloin through Desmond’s interaction with it, a process explicated in the Project’s films and evident in each photograph. Portraits of the neighborhood’s marginalized dwellers stand alongside portraits of the streets themselves, all—dwellers and streets, alike—caught in the act of living. The starkness of the black and white photography upholds the starkness of the locale, while magnifying the countervailing warm welcome of the subjects and vibrant animation all around. The viewer enters the Tenderloin with Desmond, with the objectivity of an outsider, and is left with the tension of intimacy, raw and tender.
Desmond’s San Francisco show will mark the first official exhibition of his work from the Tenderloin Project. The show will then travel to select U.S. cities, where Desmond’s penetrating images will give broader audiences a personal introduction to understanding what life is like in the Tenderloin.
The show will also feature collaborative pieces by a variety of artists from the Bay Area and beyond, including Mike Giant, Greg Mike, Mark Bode, Apex, Oliver Black and others, with an exclusive silk-screened show poster by Sean Desmond with Mike Giant.
SF-based clothing brand Black Scale will also be releasing their second run of t-shirts and first run of pull-over hoodies featuring original photographs from the Tenderloin Project.
The show opening is April 9th, 2010 at Medicine Agency.
1262 Mason Street, San Francisco CA 94108.
