Larry Towell | The World From My Front Porch

Exhibition Dates: February 9 – March 20, 2008

The gallery is pleased to present its fifth exhibition of work by Larry Towell. As a student of Fine Arts at York University, he was schooled in the basics of photography, learning to use a camera and process black-and-white-film. Along with poetry, prose and music, Towell began to utilize photography as a tool to explore the inherent inequalities of society, a pursuit that he continues to this day.

Towell’s work is an investigation of land and belonging – believing that land makes people who they are, and that the loss of land is synonymous with a loss of identity. In previous projects, Towell’s reportage of war and famine showed families in dire conditions.  Between travels, he began a photo-essay of his own family life.  “The World from My Front Porch” is the culmination of 20 years of photographing his wife, Ann, and their four children, mostly made within 100 yards of the front porch of their 75-acre sharecrop farm in Shetland, Ontario.

Larry Towell is the first Canadian born member of the prestigious Magnum Agency, whose photographers bridge the divide between journalism and art, and between the objective statement and the personal point of view. Towell’s work is exhibited and collected around the world. He has won many international photo awards including the Henri Cartier-Bresson Award (first recipient); the World Press Photo of the Year; The Hasselblad Award; The Alfred Eisenstadt Award; and The Prix Nadar. He is the author of 11 books. The World from My Front Porch, co-published by Bulger Gallery Press, Chris Boot Ltd., and the Archive of Modern Conflict, contains over 160 photographs, and will be released in the spring of 2008. A touring retrospective exhibition of the same title opens at George Eastman House, NY, on February 16, 2008.