Joe’s Junkyard and Growth
Two new photo exhibits come to the Catherine Smith Gallery

Appalachian State University presents two new photography exhibitions at the Catherine J. Smith Gallery in Boone, NC. Joe’s Junkyard and Growth: The Garden will be on view from January 26 through March 4, 2009. Joe’s Junkyard is a photographic study by Lisa Kereszi of a junkyard that was owned by her family. Growth: The Garden includes photographs by Taj Forer and members of Anathoth Community Garden. The garden images were produced during a residency organized by CAM—Contemporary Art Museum in Raleigh.

Both exhibitions are curated by Jody Servon, assistant professor and director of the Catherine J. Smith Gallery.

The first floor gallery features images by Lisa Kereszi. Joe’s Junkyard includes nineteen large color photographs by Kereszi as well as film excerpts from A Steady Grind, a documentary produced by Lisa’s sister Victoria Kereszi. A screening of full film will take place on March 4 in Belk Library. Photographer Lisa Kereszi began taking pictures in the family junkyard as a teenager; she later realized the junkyard was a special place chock full of family history.

With fond recollection, Kereszi states, “I am truly a product of the idea of one man’s trash being another man’s treasure.” Kereszi’s junkyard story makes for an epic tale—money, near bankruptcy, family feuds, violence, drugs, death, and suicide. Kereszi depicts her family with honesty and integrity; she allows visitors entry to intimate moments in vivid color. The photographs included in the exhibition were made between 1998 and 2003. In 2003, the junkyard was sold to a competitor; these images survive as a fitting testament to the people who spent their lives there.

On view in the gallery on the second floor is Growth: The Garden. This exhibition includes large color photographs made by Taj Forer and intimate black-and-white and color images created by eight community members. This project commenced in the spring of 2007 with Taj Forer making photographs on the grounds of Anathoth Community Garden. This work at the garden, however, was missing something—the viewpoints of garden members who worked the land and enjoyed its fruits. After realizing this, Forer led a series of workshops for eager photographers: Geneva Cauble; Matthew Davis; Tony Hackney; Charlotte Hughes; Doris Long; and Cynthia, Dylan, and John Webb. Forer’s instructions were “to make pictures of whatever you are interested in, not what you think you should make pictures of.”

During that time, Forer and the workshop participants explored public and private spaces in and around Cedar Grove. Their images offer up a shrimp farmer’s first harvest, as well as a peek inside Doris’s freezer, brimming with vegetables saved for winter meals. Growth: The Garden is about the wealth not only of the produce grown at Anathoth Community Garden in Cedar Grove, but of the people who turned the vacant land into a sacred space for health and healing. The people of Anathoth Community Garden prove that our world is ripe with possibilities. This project includes audio interviews with the photographers and was supported and organized by CAM—Contemporary Art Museum in Raleigh.

Curator of these exhibitions, Jody Servon states “The photographs and recordings made for Growth: The Garden and Joe’s Junkyard invite us to rethink our relationships with other people and with the environments we inhabit. We are fortunate to have the opportunity to see works by and hear both of these talented and accomplished photographers: Lisa Kereszi and Taj Forer. I believe their visits to campus will be valuable learning experiences for our students and community members.”

About the Artists

Taj Forer was born in 1981 in New Jersey. He received a MFA in Photography from UNC-Chapel Hill and his BA from Sarah Lawrence College. Forer is currently serving as a Lecturer of Photography in the Art Departments at UNC-Chapel Hill and City College, New York. Forer was a 2007-2008 Artist-in-Residence at CAM—Contemporary Art Museum in Raleigh. He serves as a co-founder of Daylight Magazine, the award- winning biannual publication of contemporary documentary photography. Forer’s work has been exhibited throughout the world and was published in 2007 by Charta Art Books (Milano, Italy) in a full-length monograph titled Threefold Sun. In 2008, Photo District News selected Forer as one of their ‘PDN 30’ Photographers and he is a current nominee for the 2009 KLM Paul Award. His work is included in the following collections: Sir Elton John Collection, London, UK; North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh, NC; Mint Museum of Art, Charlotte, NC; and The Center for Documentary Studies, Durham, NC. Publications include: The New Yorker, Orion Magazine, Metropolis Magazine, Shots Magazine, PDN, and Hotshoe Magazine.

Lisa Kereszi was born in 1973 in Chester, Pennsylvania. In 1995 she graduated from Bard College with a Bachelor of Arts with a concentration in Photography. After college she moved to New York City and worked as an assistant to Nan Goldin. In 2000 she received a Master of Fine Arts degree from the Yale University School of Art in New Haven, Connecticut. She is now on the faculty as a Lecturer at the Yale School of Art, and as Acting Director of Undergraduate Studies in Photography. Kereszi’s work is in many public and private collections including: The Whitney Museum of American Art; Altoids Curiously Strong Collection of the NewMuseum of Contemporary Art; Brooklyn Museum of Art; Ogden Museum of Southern Art; the Berkeley Art Museum; and the Yale University Art Gallery. Kereszi is a recipient of the 2005 Baum Award for Emerging
American Photographers. Venues for solo shows include Yancey Richardson Gallery, New York; Galleries at Moore College in Philadelphia; Alcott Gallery at University of North Carolina; Matrix Gallery at UC Berkeley.

Her editorial work has appeared in books and magazines, including The New York Times Magazine, The New Yorker, Nest, New York, Harper’s, W, The London Telegraph Sunday Magazine, Details, GQ, Black Book,
Jane, Newsweek, House & Garden, Penthouse, Nylon, zingmagazine, Flaunt, wallpaper* and others. In 2003 Kereszi was included in the list of the 30 top emerging photographers by Photo District News. Books on her work include: Fantasies published by Damiani Editore in Spring 2008 and one is forthcoming from Nazraeli Press in Spring 2009.

The Catherine J. Smith Gallery is located at 733 Rivers Street in Farthing Auditorium on the Appalachian State University campus in Boone, NC. Admission is free. Hours are Monday through Friday from 10AM to 5PM.

For more information, visit www.art.appstate.edu/cjs or call (828)262-7338. For more information about Plemmons Student Union, visit http://studentunion.appstate.edu/ or call 828-262-3032.