Patti Smith: Camera Solo — Events & Exhibitions at The Detroit Institute of Arts This is the first American museum exhibition to focus on the photography of artist, poet, and performer Patti Smith. Smith's photographs are infused with personal meaning and highlight the rich relationships between art, architecture, poetry and the everyday. This selection of images from the past decade reveals the artists, poets, authors, family and friends from whom Smith draws inspiration. The exhibition includes 70 black and white gelatin silver prints and a small selection of original Polaroids and items from Smith’s personal collection. In the era of digital imaging and manipulation, Smith’s works champion the use of photography in its most classical sense: as a tool to document a “found” moment. She finds the poetic qualities of a particular time and place and captures that beauty on film. The exhibition is accompanied by an illustrated catalogue featuring an interview with Smith by exhibition curator Susan L. Caption
Cindy Sherman Cindy Sherman (American, b. 1954) is widely recognized as one of the most important and influential artists in contemporary art. Throughout her career, she has presented a sustained, eloquent, and provocative exploration of the construction of contemporary identity and the nature of representation, drawn from the unlimited supply of images from movies, TV, magazines, the Internet, and art history. Working as her own model for more than 30 years, Sherman has captured herself in a range of guises and personas which are at turns amusing and disturbing, distasteful and affecting. To create her photographs, she assumes multiple roles of photographer, model, makeup artist, hairdresser, stylist, and wardrobe mistress. Bringing together more than 170 photographs, this retrospective survey traces the artist’s career from the mid 1970s to the present. The exhibition is organized by Eva Respini, Associate Curator, with Lucy Gallun, Curatorial Assistant, Department of Photography.