Saw the show this past Monday. Thing is, it's a history museum, and they present photography/art much differently from an art museum. To me, the exhibit was hokey and indulgent. Hokey because, well what else would you call 4x4 prints mounted to plastic and strung on hooks from the ceiling that one had to navigate around and walk into weird U shapes to view. Indulgent, because creating a department store like window display from photos puts the emphasis much more on the person staging the work than the work itself. And, obviously because it's the Chicago History Museum, the work is Chicago-centric. Many of the hanging prints are scratched, the lighting is challenging, and the black walls bit... oh what to write? The printing on the large prints isn't impressive at all. The nicest prints are the 4 framed prints near the entrance to the exhibit. This collection is not from the Maloof trove, but from the 10 percent Goldstein collection. Goldstein to his credit has tackled his trove with darkroom wet printing -- and those 4 prints are nice. Nonetheless, I was in Chicago on assignment, and part of my pre-shoot day arrival plans were centered on catching the exhibit and walking around the town a small bit, and visiting Central Camera -- they opened in 1899! Chicago deep dish pizza -- okay, loved Chicago -- not so much love for the pizza. NYC brick over thin crust that's the shizzle. And Harry Carry's -- ugh, cue stomach roll - nuff said. Amalfi now called Kenzie Hotel -- superb. The big chrome bean must be sean.
