The Alice Austen House, a fantastic and under-acknowledged resource for photography in New York City, is an exhibition space and museum dedicated to the ground-breaking, absolutely independent and unique photographer Alice Austen (1866-1952). One of America’s earliest and most prolific female photographers, Alice Austen broke away from the constraints of the Victorian era to create her own independent life.

Help the Alice Austen House take some much needed steps toward its own preservation and restoration via the 2012 New York initiative Partners in Preservation.  All you need to do is go to http://www.PartnersinPreservation.com and VOTE – a vote for this site will help direct national funding to keep the Alice Austen House vital and able to continue its programming of exhibitions and education in a beautiful, unique historic space. Voting ends tonight, 11:59PM EST on Monday, May 21.

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Through June 14, 2012 the Alice Austen House Museum is pleased to present Foreclosed: Documents from the American Housing Crisis. The exhibition includes works by: Bruce Gilden, Lauren Greenfield, Todd Hido, Imara Moore, John Moore, John Francis Peters, T.J. Proechel, Brian Shumway, Brian Ulrich and Guillaume Zuili, examining how artists are using photography to record the aftermath of the housing bubble; from its’ beginning in 2006 to the dramatic effects it still has on the American Landscape today. The artists and photographers in the exhibition depict the ruins of rich and poor neighborhoods, as well as the families affected by the economic downturn. As a result, the exhibition aims to explore the disintegration of the American dream and how it effects a culture where home ownership is no longer a reality.

Foreclosed: Documents from the American Housing Crisis
On view through June 14, 2012

The Alice Austen House Museum
2 Hylan Boulevard
Staten Island, NY 10305

The Wild Project is pleased to present an exhibition of limited-edition prints produced by Aperture Foundation. Aperture Foundation is a leading photography non-profit dedicated to promoting photography in all its forms based in Chelsea. The exhibition focuses on contemporary artists whose work, in many cases, has been featured in Aperture Magazine, Aperture books, in exhibitions at Aperture Gallery or have been winners of the Portfolio Prize contest. This exhibition features Michel Campeau, Maureen Drennan, Doug DuBois, JH Engström, Todd Hido, Kalle Kataila, Mark Lyon, Edgar Martins, and Bas Princen.

Aperture Foundation is proud to have one of the longest running limited-edition print and portfolio programs in the United States. The print program started in the 1960’s with collaborations between the master photographers Paul Strand and later with Edward Steichen. The print program expanded over the years to offer richly diverse editions and portfolios to art lovers and collectors. Today the program works with several artists’ estates and presents prints that range from masters of the medium, to established contemporary artists and finally highlights many emerging artists of tomorrow. Proceeds from the sales benefit the artists and helps maintain the quality of Aperture’s publications and public programming. The print program supports the organization’s non-profit mission to advance photography in all its forms.

May 11–September 7, 2011
Opening Reception: Wednesday, June 29, 6-8pm

Wild Project
195 East 3rd Street
New York, NY 10009

Image: My Sister’s bedroom by Doug Dubois, 2004, courtesy Doug Dubois

Kick off 2011 with some new and exciting shows in Chelsea:

© Todd Hido

Todd Hido: Fragmented Narratives at Bruce Silverstein Gallery

Renowned as a master of sequencing in book format, Todd Hido juxtaposes images from his influential monographs House Hunting, A Road Divided, Outskirts, and Between the Two with portraits and new images never before exhibited. Hido successfully extends his narrative from a linear book format to an almost cinematic storyline forged by his grouping and pairing of images unrelated in time or place, his female subjects acting as the characters in his photographic sequences. Hido’s eerily lit nocturnal images of suburban houses allude to the often discomforting, lonely American scenes by the painter Edward Hopper as well as mirror the director David Lynch’s interest and attention to the seedy underside of suburban American culture.

Fragmented Narratives
January 6 – February 12, 2011

Bruce Silverstein Gallery
535 West 24th Street
New York, NY

Also on view:

Christopher Williams
For Example: Dix-Huit Leçons Sur La Société Industrielle (Revision 12)

As the title may suggest, this show is just a subset of a larger ongoing project; Revision 1-11 were shown at David Zwirner as well as other institutions throughout Europe. In Christopher Williams’s fifth solo exhibition at David Zwirner Gallery, the Conceptual artist stays true to form and presents a series of crisp and clean photographs that do not have evident relationships to one another. He offers no explanation for his works, and instead invites the viewers to draw the links and connections themselves.

Although the show may present itself as more of a riddle, the lush/stark photographs can stand on their own and are worth seeing.

For Example: Dix-Huit Leçons Sur La Société Industrielle (Revision 12)
January 7 – February 12, 2011

David Zwirner Gallery
525 West 19th Street
New York, NY

January White Sale
curated by Beth Rudin DeWoody

January White Sale, curated by Beth Rudin DeWoody, is an exhibition of white works from over fifty well-known and emerging international artists. A play on the slightly dated term for a department store bedding clearance, January White Sale is anything but. The exhibition blends both important post-war American works, the focus of the gallery, with DeWoody’s playful and sometimes highly provocative aesthetic.

Works in various media such as painting, photography, sculpture, works on paper, assemblage, and video arise from a surreal and rarely seen all-white installation. It is also in this viewing that the overlooked differentiation in shades of white becomes apparent. The combination of titaniums, bones, antiques, and ivories, along with the intricate silhouettes, create an even more compelling installation. With the lack of color in art, the form becomes most important, and emerges front and center.”

January White Sale
January 13 – February 12, 2011

Loretta Howard Gallery
525 West 26th Street
New York, NY

#2077 by Todd Hido

The Copenhagen Photo Festival, opening in Denmark on May 12th, will feature a photo exhibition installed on the city of Copenhagen itself. The exhibit entitled Day and Night will be presented in the form of banners, projections and billboards and will feature works by an eclectic roster of artists including Walead Beshty, who was featured in Aperture magazine issue 192, Aperture published Tim Davis, Todd Hido and Kohei Yoshiyuki who was featured in Aperture Magazine issue 188.

In addition there will be special events hosted by the city’s galleries and a conference on contemporary art photography at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts on May 14th. The festival runs May 12th through May 20th, 2010.

Click here to learn more about the 2010 Copenhagen Photo Festival

Click here to purchase Limited-Edition Todd Hido print #2077 from the series House Hunting

Click here to purchase Limited-Edition Tim Davis print Democrat and Republican

Last April, photographer Todd Hido discussed his work, inspirations, and influences as part of an ongoing lecture series hosted by Aperture Foundation and presented by the department of photography, Parsons The New School for Design.

Click here to listen to a one-minute excerpt of Hido’s talk.

Listen to Hido’s talk in its entirety here

On view in the slide show above are photographs from his different series of work including anonymous models in motel rooms, interiors of abandoned houses, as well as outside views of homes at night. Born in Ohio in 1968, Hido’s work can be found in many prominent collections, including the Guggenheim Museum in New York, the Whitney Museum of American Art, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. He has exhibited widely in galleries and museums across the country and he has published several monographs such as House Hunting (Nazraeli Press, 2001) and  Between the Two (Nazraeli Press, 2006). He recently published a limited-edition artist book Ohio as part of the Subscription Series, combining pictures he took as a child and recent photos taken with the same camera. He is also releasing a new monograph Witness No. 7 (Nazraeli Press) this spring on abandoned homes and the stories of previous lives they hold.