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17/10/2008

Barbara Grover

Sherry Frumkin Gallery, Santa Monica

Sherry Frumkin Gallery is pleased to present Refuge(e) – Moments with the Darfuri of Iridimi, Barbara Grover’s second solo exhibition of photographs at the gallery in its continuing commitment to expose significant artistic responses to major political issues. The exhibition illuminates the genocide crisis in Darfur, but also serves to educate the viewer, turning the gallery into a classroom for political action. Refuge(e is a photography-based multi-media exhibit that evolved from photographer Barbara Grover’s seven week visit in 2007 to the Iridimi Refugee Camp where she received special permission from the United Nations to photograph. The resulting body of work gives viewers a rarely seen look at daily refugee life – a struggle that is often overshadowed by the fighting in Darfur itself.

The exhibit consists of 25 medium to large-scale color photographs, a six-minute documentary short, The Women of Iridimi – the Story of the Jewish World Watch Solar Cooker Project, and a 2-minute multi-media piece called “Reality Check.” The individual photos show what the refugees are doing to reclaim hope and dignity in the confines of an isolated, drought-ridden refugee camp. The documentary short, which will be shown on flat screen TV on one gallery wall, tells the story of how solar cooking has transformed the lives of refugee women and girls. The multi-media piece juxtaposes our reality with that in the refugee camp. Proceeds from the sale of the photographs will go to the Solar Cooker Project and other Darfur refugee relief programs organized by Jewish World Watch.

This exhibit is the first of its kind about Darfur. Previous exhibits were critical in exposing the atrocities of genocide in Darfur. By creating an unforgettable picture of those who live the conflict every day, Refuge(e) serves as a wake up call to the international community that we must not forget the Darfuri who survived. The goal of the exhibit is not only educate and raise public awareness of a little understood international crisis, but to inspire activism. Every visitor to the gallery will be able to design a unique pre-addressed postcard that will be sent with a focus on to the next President, urging him to make ending genocide in Darfur a priority. “Almost every refugee I met asked me one thing: please tell your President and the American people to bring peace to Darfur,” Grover said. “They believed in their hearts we had the power to do that, and I am hoping that this exhibit not only helps people to understand this crisis, but also moves them to activism.”

The exhibit is an extraordinary and innovative resource for educators interested in creating a unique classroom experience for teaching world events, genocide and particularly the Darfur conflict itself. The artist is partnering with Jewish World Watch (JWW) and Facing History and Ourselves to offer study plans and gallery activities for middle school, high school and college students. Barbara Grover left her political consulting firm, Skelton, Grover and Associates, in 1996 to take on the creation of photographic works that would effect social change. Her exhibition of photographs, “THIS LAND TO ME – SOME CALL IT PALESTINE, OTHERS ISRAEL” at Sherry Frumkin Gallery in 2004, inaugurated the gallery’s new location at the Santa Monica Airport. The exhibition has since traveled throughout the country and was selected for the international photography biennial, FOTOFEST. It is currently being used as the core of an innovative high school curriculum by The Michael Harrington Center for Democratic Values and Social Change at Queens College, New York.

Grover has traveled to over 40 countries, many facing conflict and poverty, to create photographic works that effect social and political change. Winner of the Golden Light Award for Photojournalism, her work distills some of the most complex issues of our time into compelling human stories. Her work has appeared in galleries throughout the US. Working largely for non-profit organizations – such as the Los Angeles Free Clinic, Whole Child International and the Hide & Seek Foundation, Grover’s work has appeared in numerous publications including Time, Scholastic and LA Weekly, and internationally in Stern and Italian magazines such as Gulliver and Happy Web.

Opening Saturday, October 18, 2008 f rom 6 - 9

Sherry Frumkin Gallery
3026 Airport Ave. (Studio 21) - Santa Monica
Free admission

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