Zoe Strauss, Under I-95 2008

Today ended up being packed, and I had to choose between two different art events that sounded really appealing, a puppet show and Zoe Strauss’s 8th show under Philadelphia’s I-95 (at Front and Mifflin Streets). I’m sorry I missed the puppet show, but I’m glad I made it out to Zoe Strauss’s photography show. It was one of the most unique art events that I’ve been to. How many other art shows to you see skateboarders going through?

Strauss’s subject matter runs to very working class imagery that reflects the lives of normal people (maybe even hard luck people) all over this country. It seems that she just gets in her car, goes out, and takes as many pictures as she can. Her subject matter varies wildly, but she seems to like signs (especially impromptu or modified ones), destruction, men kissing, painted faces and injuries. That’s a few of the themes I seemed to see cropping up, but I wasn’t trying to follow undercurrents too closely. Mostly, I was impressed by the wild array of her imagery and by the well chosen space. I have never seen an art show that covered so much ground.

I didn’t really take photos of the pictures, but, if you can’t tell, they went all the way to the back of the space you can see here. She had one print posted on two, three and occasionally all four sides of the support columns. Visitors were given a map of the prints titles and numbers.

You can see lots more the photography Strauss showed today on her Flickr page. Best of all, you could buy prints for only $5. I bought the first one shown here. The 2nd one, the one I really wanted, had sold out.

Now here’s a weird thing — a couple in line in front of me bought several prints, but they also bought the first one and they also wanted the 2nd one. How random is that?

And:

Here’s one last photo. A message from Zoe to America: