The New Yorker
October 31, 2017
by Doreen St. Félix

The photographer LaToya Ruby Frazier can capture the decline of an entire economy, the vulnerable cycles of American industry, within a single human face. Like the documentarians Dorothea Lange and Gordon Parks before her, she scales down social upheaval to the intimate, modest scale of portraiture. It is the long shadow of the Rust Belt steel boom that especially compels her; she is a black child of Braddock, a “financially distressed municipality” of Pittsburgh, according to the Pennsylvania government, where Andrew Carnegie and the barons of metal had once established monopolies on that dangerous, alchemical work.

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Courtesy of: The New Yorker

From 10 October, the Fondation Louis Vuitton is hosting a remarkable new exhibition to present works from New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). The display—Being Modern: MoMA in Paris—will house artwork that has been acquired by the prestigious institution since its founding in 1929.

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‘It’s a unique opportunity to tell the story of how the museum’s unparalleled holdings were assembled both in and outside of New York,’ says MoMA director Glenn Lowry.

Iconic artists will be included in the showcase, with the likes of Paul Cézanne, Edward Hopper, Henri Matisse, René Magritte, Pablo Picasso, Marcel Duchamp and Andy Warhol drawing the majority of the attention.

The Parisian setting poses as a swanky alternative ‘home’ to these works which may have otherwise been put away in storage during the MoMA’s renovation. It could be argued that the change of location offers a more dynamic viewpoint on some of the art in the collection. Against Fondation Louis Vuitton, which is synonymous with affluent style, works such as LaToya Ruby Frazier’s photo series, The Notion of Family (2001-present)—depicting the livelihood of a black working class family—manage to stand out and feel more poignant.

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Courtesy of: Arts & Collections International