September 07th, 2012

Photographer Dennis Manarchy’s new exhibition opens at River North gallery

• CHICAGO ART EXHIBITIONNS
• SEPTEMBER 4, 2012
• BY: MARY A. OSBORNE

"There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion,” wrote Sir Francis Bacon. The wonderfully strange beauties of photographer Dennis Manarchy’s “Metal” collection will be on display at Hilton | Asmus Contemporary from Sept. 7 to Sept. 28, 2012. Manarchy, whose books “Metal” and “Metal 2” won Graphis Gold in 2009 and 2010, is rated as one of the world’s top 100 photographers.

The photographer describes “Metal” as a “post apocalyptic love story.” One of the heroines of the tale is a lovely woman, skin painted silver, who wears blue glasses. The glasses, which serve to protect the woman from the perils of the imagined catastrophe, are from the personal collection of Steve Erenberg, who apprenticed under Raymond Loewy (the father of industrial design). Erenberg’s collection of 19th century smoke helmets, scientific gadgets, early medical devices and optometry pieces are curated by Manarchy in the photographic narrative of “Metal.”

Over the past 30 years Manarchy has won numerous national and international awards for his work on campaigns from Porsche to Nike to Harley Davidson to Dior. His work has been featured in many magazines including Vogue, Vanity Fair, Zoom, Photo, Life, Time, and most recently Black & White. The photographer was raised in the Midwest and graduated from the Rochester Institute of Technology with a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree. Upon graduation he served an apprenticeship for the legendary photographer Irving Penn.

Manarchy’s latest project, “The Vanishing Cultures: An American Portrait,” is a philanthropic mission which focuses on America’s vanishing cultures. Celebrating our nation’s diverse people, the project will involve a 20,000 mile journey across North America with the world’s largest film camera. Manarchy aims to document and commemorate over 50 cultures—the Appalachian, the Hopi and Inuit among them—before they disappear forever.

To celebrate the opening of Manarchy’s “Metal” exhibition, there will be a reception at Hilton | Asmus Contemporary on Friday, Sept. 7 from 5-10 p.m. The gallery, located at 716 N. Wells Street, is in Chicago’s River North Art District at the corner of Wells and Superior.