The Jewish Journey: Frederic Brenner’s
Photographic Odyssey," is an exhibit of epic proportions
now on view at the Brooklyn Museum of Art. Canvassing the entire
world from St. Lawrence Island, off Alaska, all the way East
to Birobidzhan, an autonomous Jewish region formerly part of
the USSR, Brenner has snapped the Jewish experience in seemingly
every nook and cranny of the globe.
Brenner stretches the possibilities of portraiture, capturing
a wide range of humanity, in a variety of social classes and
in innumerable settings through his black-and-white photographs.
They speak to the resilience and strength of people pushed to
the brink, and of the power of faith.
Brenner, 44, was trained in social anthropology and has spent
the last 25 years on this project. "The Jewish Journey,"
assembled by guest curator Dara Meyers-Kingsley, includes more
than 140 of Brenner’s gelatin silver photos on fiber-based paper
– culled from 80,000 negatives. (To coincide with the exhibition,
HarperCollins has just published a two-volume book of Brenner’s
work, "Diaspora: Homelands in Exile.")
Although he was trained in social anthropology, Meyers-Kingsley
is careful to point out that Brenner is not a photojournalist
and that he does "set up" or "construct"
some of the compositions, rather than capture spontaneous moments.
"He researches a subject extensively before deciding what
image will convey his idea. He then storyboards the shot, puts
together a crew, assembles the subjects – sometimes numbering
in the hundreds – and produces the image in a single day,"
explains Meyers-Kingsley.
One of those amazing "set up" shots was of cab drivers
on the beach in Coney Island. The cabs are parked in a wide V
– like migrating birds in flight – with their drivers perched
on them. The caption offers the immigrants’ former occupations
– air force pilot, mechanical engineer, etc. – which they left
behind in their homelands.
On the opposite end of the spectrum of Jewish life in Brooklyn,
Brenner photographs "Gay and Lesbian Families" in the
desert room of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden’s Steinhardt Conservatory.
While the cluttered composition is less successful than his other
works, it’s still an effective play on words.
Brenner’s photographs put a face on horrible atrocities such
as his series of Argentinian "mothers of the missing,"
women whose children were kidnapped, tortured or murdered in
the 1970s during the military dictatorship. These women with
their naked, lined faces are posed in antiseptic tiled settings.
Perhaps in a hospital or sanitarium, these grieving mothers are
not coddled in warm, sunlight-filled sanctuaries, but shot in
cold, hard rooms nearly 30 years after their children had been
taken.
In Brenner’s series on Birobidzhan (an autonomous region of the
former Soviet Union created by Josef Stalin in 1934 to house
Jews), exhausted, dirt-smudged factory workers show in their
wearied looks the failed experiment that drew Jews from the Ukraine,
Russia, France, Argentina and America in the hopes of creating
a Jewish homeland.
In a color video, "Excerpt from The Last Marranos,"
a family in Portugal demonstrates their Passover ritual. Held
in secret ever since the Spanish Inquisition (1478-1834), the
"christianized Jews" utterly jumble their customs.
The family no longer knows the true meaning behind the rituals,
but they continue the traditions of making unleavened bread while
secreted away in their attic and lighting Sabbath candles hidden
in a cupboard.
While accomplishing the serious business of documenting a race
of people who have been chased into exile, Brenner isn’t afraid
to let a bit of levity slip into his frames.
In "Michael and Michelle Cohen, Purim," a young couple
sporting snorkels pose near the marshy outskirts of Hong Kong
as if they were actually thinking of diving into the muck and
mire.
In a 1995 portrait taken in Commack, N.Y., Brenner photographs
a suburban American family posing for another photographer against
a backdrop of Jerusalem’s holy Wailing Wall as part of the Suffolk
Y Jewish Community Center’s "World’s Largest Jewish Performing
Arts Festival."
In one particularly absurd, incongruous shot in Johannesburg,
South Africa, taken in 2001, a perky white woman with teased
hair and a string of pearls is placed near two rows of decidedly
unhappy black women with papers in their hands. A large sign
reads, "Let me teach your maid Jewish cooking. Call Brenda."
Did we mention the numerous mounted heads of dead animals in
the composition?
Brenner does not limit his subjects to the Jewish Everyman. His
Diaspora includes portraits featuring dozens of Jewish celebrities,
which reminded me of Adam Sandler’s "Hanukkah Song."
A photograph of a labyrinth on Ellis Island shot in 1996 is populated
with Roy Lichtenstein, Lauren Bacall, Dr. Ruth Westheimer, Philip
Glass, Ralph Lauren and Isaac Stern!
The sheer number and variety of the photographs wears on the
viewer, and soon the exhibit is no longer about what makes these
subjects Jewish, but what makes them and everyone in the exhibition
hall the same. We’re all only human, and we’re everything that
is noble, funny, strong, nurturing and weak about being human.
Thanks to Frederic Brenner for bringing all of us together to
experience a palpable sense of our global community.
"The Jewish Journey: Frederic Brenner’s
Photographic Odyssey" is on view through Jan. 11 at the
Brooklyn Museum of Art, 200 Eastern Parkway at Washington Avenue
in Prospect Heights. Admission is $6, $3 students with valid
ID and seniors, free children younger than 12. For more information,
call (718) 638-5000 or visit the Web site at www.brooklynmuseum.org.
