Outsiders ─ American Photography and Film 1950s-1980s

A visual feast of America’s most interesting characters, Outsiders tours the United States from the late 1950s to the early 1980s through the lens of artists like Diane Arbus, Gary Winogrand, and D.A. Pennebaker. In a time of intense political and cultural upheaval, these legendary photographers and filmmakers turned their attention to individuals and communities on the margins of mainstream society.
 
In highlighting their subjects’ differences and celebrating their chosen families, these artists countered the cultural homogeneity of the period following World War II. Cross-dressers, musicians, performers, biker gangs, and protests set the stage for a broader range of human experience, creating the distinctly individualistic American culture enjoyed today. Portfolios and works by Diane Arbus, Garry Winogrand, Nan Goldin, Danny Lyon, Kenneth Anger, D.A. Pennebaker, and Shirley Clarke highlight these expressive members of the vanguard. Warm and colorful photographs from the Casa Susanna Collection (1950s-1960s) bring into focus the pleasure a group of cross-dressers feel in living together intimately, with the bravery to defy the status quo and set the stage for a more inclusive culture.

Sophie Hackett is a writer and Associate Curator, Photography, at the Art Gallery of Ontario; she curated or co-curated many exhibitions at the AGO includingBarbara Kruger: Untitled (It) (2010); Max Dean (2012); What It Means To be Seen: Photography and Queer Visibility andFan the Flames: Queer Positions in Photography (2014); and Introducing Suzy Lake (2014). She is the co-curator ofOutsiders.

Jim Shedden is the Manager of Publishing at the Art Gallery of Ontario. Prior to this, he was with Bruce Mau Design and at the AGO as a film curator and performing arts programmer. Shedden directed films on Michael Snow and Stan Brakhage and a feature documentary, I Drink. He has written extensively on music, film, video, art, and design, and has been involved in the artist-run scene in Toronto since the late 1980s. He is the co-curator ofOutsiders.

Kate Bussard is Peter C. Bunnell curator of photography at Princeton University, New Jersey.

Lia Gangitano is the founder of Participant, Inc., an alternative gallery space in New York.

Martha Kirszenbaum is an independent curator and writer based in Paris, and the director and curator of the Flax Foundation, Los Angeles.

Tess Takahashi is an assistant professor of film at York University, Toronto.