Bruce Davidson: Central Park - Tapa blanda

Bruce Davidson's photographs of Central Park reveal a humane, democratic haven of breathtaking beauty and ecological secrets, as well as a site for wondrous adventures.

Renowned as an intrepid explorer of the urban terrain, and a member of Magnum Photos, Bruce Davidson has challenged himself in a remarkable new way, taking on the visual and metaphorical scope of Central Park. This chronicler of the New York subway, the civil-rights movement, and of life in East Harlem finds himself-- as suddenly and surprisingly as Alice in Wonderland (who appears in one of his more humorous photographs)-- in his city's verdant oasis. Davidson's photographic approach to the park's wildlife-- human and otherwise-- varies as much in format (panoramic, 35mm, and square) as it does in emotional quality. Always compassionate, often idiosyncratic, this work reveals a sublime and at times transcendent vision. Davidson seems as comfortable with a wedding, a landscape, or a roller-blader as he does with Central Park's more permanent residents-- a newborn bird, or a man seeking refuge on a cold winter's night.... Here, Davidson intuitively discovers a multiplicity of mysteries, eccentricities, and characters that together reflect the vibrant and complex city of which the park is the heart and soul. At the same time, Bruce Davidson's Central Park becomes a metaphor for a larger human experience.

Davidson's evocative rendering of Central Park is consistent with the vision of its original designers, Frederick Law Olmsted and his partner Calvert Vaux. Created to serve all classes of society, it was the country's first municipal park conceived by urban reformers and built by immigrant labor. Now, as then, it provides green space for people from all walks of life and all countries of the world. Today, Central Park represents six percent of Manhattan's total acreage and is the most frequently visited park in the country.

Complemented by an essay by the author, journalist, and translator Marie Winn, a preface by writer and Central Park Conservancy Director Elizabeth Barlow Rogers, and Davidson's own anecdotal reflections, Central Park provides an expansive view of this wonderfully intricate and varied space.

Bruce Davidson
Central Park

Bruce Davidson's photographs of Central Park reveal a humane, democratic haven of breathtaking beauty and ecological secrets, as well as a site for wondrous adventures.

Renowned as an intrepid explorer of the urban terrain, and a member of Magnum Photos, Bruce Davidson has challenged himself in a remarkable new way, taking on the visual and metaphorical scope of Central Park. This chronicler of the New York subway, the civil-rights movement, and of life in East Harlem finds himself-- as suddenly and surprisingly as Alice in Wonderland (who appears in one of his more humorous photographs)-- in his city's verdant oasis. Davidson's photographic approach to the park's wildlife-- human and otherwise-- varies as much in format (panoramic, 35mm, and square) as it does in emotional quality. Always compassionate, often idiosyncratic, this work reveals a sublime and at times transcendent vision. Davidson seems as comfortable with a wedding, a landscape, or a roller-blader as he does with Central Park's more permanent residents-- a newborn bird, or a man seeking refuge on a cold winter's night.... Here, Davidson intuitively discovers a multiplicity of mysteries, eccentricities, and characters that together reflect the vibrant and complex city of which the park is the heart and soul. At the same time, Bruce Davidson's Central Park becomes a metaphor for a larger human experience.

Davidson's evocative rendering of Central Park is consistent with the vision of its original designers, Frederick Law Olmsted and his partner Calvert Vaux. Created to serve all classes of society, it was the country's first municipal park conceived by urban reformers and built by immigrant labor. Now, as then, it provides green space for people from all walks of life and all countries of the world. Today, Central Park represents six percent of Manhattan's total acreage and is the most frequently visited park in the country.

Complemented by an essay by the author, journalist, and translator Marie Winn, a preface by writer and Central Park Conservancy Director Elizabeth Barlow Rogers, and Davidson's own anecdotal reflections,Central Park provides an expansive view of this wonderfully intricate and varied space.

Bruce Davidson began photographing in his early teens in Oak Park, Illinois. Later he attended the Rochester Institute of Technology and Yale University. He worked for LIFE magazine for a year before joining Magnum Photos, Inc. in 1958. In 1962 Davidson received a Guggenheim Fellowship to photograph the civil-rights movement. In 1963 the Museum of Modern Art gave him a one-man exhibition that included his essays "The Dwarf," "Brooklyn Gang," and "England." He received the first photography grant from the National Endowment for the Arts in 1967, which allowed him to continue photographing one block in New York City-- East 100th Street. This project (begun in 1966) was published in 1970 by Harvard University Press and was a major exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art. His book, Bruce Davidson Photographs, published in 1978, is a collection of twenty years' work, and was exhibited at the International Center of Photography, the Walker Arts Center, and at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris. His most recent Aperture books are Portraits (1999) and Subway (1986). In 1987 the Smithsonian Institution presented a large exhibition of his work at the Museum of American Art.

Davidson's film Living Off the Land was shown on CBS and received the Critic's Award from the American Film Festival. His latest film, Isaac Singer's Nightmare and Mrs. Pupko's Beard, won first prize in fiction at the American Film Festival. Davidson lives in New York with his wife and has two daughters.

Marie Winn is the author of the acclaimed book The Plug-In Drug: Television, Children and the Family (1977), and the follow-up bookUnplugging the Plug-In Drug (1987). Born in Prague, Czechoslovakia, she grew up in New York City and is a translator and freelance correspondent whose articles regularly appear in theNew York Times Magazine, theWall Street Journal, Harper's Bazaar, theWashington Post, and theNew York Times Book Review. She was the Associate Producer of the 1991 filmNovember's Children-- Revolution in Prague.

Elizabeth Barlow Rogers has been the President of the Central Park Conservancy since 1980, and the Central Park Administrator since 1979. She holds a B.A. from Wellesley College and an M.A. in city planning from Yale University. From 1974 to 1979 she was a screenwriter for the Time-Life film series Wild Wild World of Animals, as well as Executive s20Director of the Central Park Task Force. She is the author ofRebuilding Central Park: A Management and Restoration Plan (1987);The Central Park Book (1978);Frederick Law Olmsted's New York (1972);The Forests and Wetlands of New York City (1971); and the co-author ofEast Hampton: A History and Guide(1976). Among her many awards and commendations, she was given the Garden Club of America Medal for Historic Preservation in 1992, and in 1994, she was awarded the National Park Foundation's Citizen Leadership Medal.