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Will Brown

A Tender Light

October 30 – December 20, 2014

Windshield Flag, 1972

Windshield Flag

1972

gelatin silver print

Will Brown Atlas Wallpaper

Atlas Wallpaper

1973

gelatin silver print

Will Brown Marie's Bar

Marie's Bar

1973

gelatin silver print

David Pransky, 1973

David Pransky

1973

8 x 10" gelatin silver print, made 2014

Signed, titled, and dated on verso

Edition 6
 

Will Brown Reba's

Reba's

1973

gelatin silver print

Will Brown Wash & Dry

Wash & Dry

1973

gelatin silver print

Will Brown Fitzwater St. Caddie

Fitzwater St. Caddie

1972

gelatin silver print

Will Brown Bainbridge & Orianna Sts. I

Bainbridge & Orianna Sts. I

1972

gelatin silver print

Will Brown Lou Mayo

Lou Mayo

1974

gelatin silver print

Will Brown Goldshlack Caddie III

Goldshlack Caddie III

1973

gelatin silver print

New Tin II, 1973

New Tin II

1973

gelatin silver print

Car Grill, 1973

Car Grill

1973

silver gelatin print

 

Will Brown Izzy's Fried Fish

Izzy's Fried Fish

1973

gelatin silver print

Sout Street Storefront, 1973

Sout Street Storefront

1973

gelatin silver print

Will Brown The Best Styles

The Best Styles

1973

gelatin silver print

will Brown Pretzel Window

Pretzel Window

1973

gelatin silver print
 

Will Brown South Street Window

South Street Window (4th & South)

1973

gelatin silver print

Will Brown American Wire Works

American Wire Works

1973

gelatin silver print

Will Brown Crown Wall

Crown Wall

1972

gelatin silver print

Steve Parker's House, 1972

Steve Parker's House

1972

gelatin silver print

Will Brown Three Men

Three Men

1971

gelatin silver print

Will Brown Floyd and Friends

Floyd and Friends

1973

gelatin silver print

One-armed boy, 1976

One-armed boy

1976

gelatin silver print

Will Brown M. Berger

M. Berger

1973

gelatin silver print

Will Brown Federal Wall Paper

Federal Wall Paper

1973

gelatin silver print

1035 Bainbridge, 1973

1035 Bainbridge

1973

gelatin silver print

 

Will Brown Corrugated

Corrugated

1972

gelatin silver print

Will Brown

David Frost

1971

gelatin silver print

Press Release

A Tender Light represents Philadelphia-based  photographer will Brown’s first solo exhibition in New York. The show features 29 intimate black and white photographs taken in the early seventies in Queen Village, an old mercantile area in south Philadelphia.

Storefronts, old cars and neighborhood residents are the primary focus here. In Fitzwater Street Caddie, from 1972, we see a bedraggled Cadillac in front of a wall scrawled with graffiti, looking like the bones of a dinosaur that once proudly roamed here. Shop windows were often shot in the early morning when the streets were empty, their dusty windows glowing in the light and criss-crossed with long shadows.  Brown’s prints capture a very tender light, similar in feeling to the light in Eugene Atget’s early morning vistas of Paris and the surrounding parks.

 

Will Brown’s photographs were featured in 2009 in Common Ground: Eight Philadelphia Photographers in the 1960’s and 1970’s at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and in a solo show this past summer at The Fabric Workshop Museum in Philadelphia. His works are held in the collections of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library of Yale University, the Smithsonian American Art Museum, and many private collections.