|
BIOGRAPHY Nubar Alexanian is a documentary photographer whose worked has been regularly featured in major magazines in the United States and Europe. For the past 25 years he has travelled to more than 30 countries focusing on long term personal projects which describe the human condition. From 1978 to 1989 he travelled extensively to Peru documenting the life and culture of the Andean people. He received a Fulbright Artist Fellowship in 1983 to continue his work in Peru which allowed him to live and work there from March through August, 1983. The culmination of this work, Stones In The Road: Photographs of Peru (Aperture Books, 1992), documents the migration of the Andean culture from the mountains to the shanty towns of Lima, caused by a fierce civil war and a growing illegal drug industry. ''For the lover of peopled enigmas and tonally rich photos splashed big across two pages, this book is a find, a breath of contemplative art in a fast-forward video world. Alexanian's pictures are metaphors. Read them like poems.'' The Boston Globe ''I believe we, reportage photographers of the human condition, have a moral duty to get as close as we can to the people we photograph and to draw attention to all the dignity in the world, as Nubar Alexanian has managed to do so well in this book. It gave me immense pleasure to see my Latin- American people portrayed with so much tenderness.'' Sebastiao Salgado ''...an authentic expression of our geography and our people making at the same time a personal statement which is artistically original and morally compelling.'' Mario Vargas Llosa In 1996 his second book, Where Music Comes From, was published by Dewi Lewis Publications, Manchester, England. This work, his first major color project, explores what inspires the great musicians of our time, documenting the creative processes of musicians such as Wynton Marsalis, Philip Glass, Emmylou Harris, Paul Simon and others. It was chosen by the New York Public Library as one of the best books of 1997 for young adults. ''Nubar Alexanian, after a five-year trek across the music landscape, has done his finest work, including such diverse music personalities as Philip Glass, Aretha Franklin, Wynton Marsalis, the Roches, Paul Simon, Junior Wells and Emmylou Harris. To prepare for this project the photographer bought their music, listened to it all, watched them rehearse and perform, hung out with them, and finally, photographed them. Alexanian's photographs are brilliant, imaginative, compelling and very moving.'' The Picture Professional by Fred & Gloria McDarrah ''I can name only a small handful of photographers now plying their trade who share Nubar's passion (for his craft and his subjects) while at the same time retaining what amounts to an unswerving committment to ''pure photojournalism,''a style of reportage in the finest documentary tradition.'' David Friend, Former Director of Photography, Life Magazine In 2001, Gloucester Photographs was published by Walker Creek Press, and is about his home town of Gloucester Massachusetts. "For those intrigued with Gloucester, these photographs are an intimate exploration of her complexity and beauty, celebrating what it is that draws us to this place and why. For those who call it home, Alexanian’s Gloucester–his people and landscapes–resonate so deeply and eloquently, they invite a reaffirmation of our devotion, revealing more of our soul than our image. In these documentary photographs, image transcends moment, specificity gives way to metaphor, and our experience is transformed to a poetic discovery of this special place." From The Book Jacket “These images manage to be beautiful and honest at the same time. They are the real Gloucester, hard edges and all,” Sebastian Junger, author, The Perfect Storm When I first saw Nubar Alexanian's tender and astute new book of photos, Gloucester Photographs, I had a sense of moving backwards in time. Images of clam diggers on mud flats, beach goers surrounding a giant sand sculpture in the shape of a deformed man, teenagers in the back of a rented limousine on prom night - all could be fifty years old, others even older. None are. Alexanian's new book and the show that commemorates it pay homage to a city and perhaps a way of life in decline: Gloucester is a community where people live near to their relatives, visit their neighbors, worship together. What could be stranger? One thing: Alexanian's treatment of fish, their eyes, their fins, their behead bodies being cleaned. In his fish photos Alexanian finds a metaphor of the people of Gloucester - endangered, atavistic, communal - and they're as riveting as they are forlorn. Christopher Millis The Boston Phoenix A sense of serenity pervades Alexanian's work in his new book,
Gloucester Photographs. Here are moments plucked from narratives, some peaceful, others
pulsing: stories we don't know, lives of which we are not part.
But Alexanian gives us enough so that we can imagine the rest,
as painful or jubilant or curious as our hearts believe the stories
to be. Haley Kaufman, The Boston Globe Arts Section JAZZ, his fourth book, is a collaboration with Wynton Marsalis and was published by Walker Creek Press in November 2002. This small book is an intimate conversation withMarsalis on tour, with stunning color photographs by Nubar Alexanian. For both Marsalis and Alexanian, jazz is a metaphor for the best kind of human interaction, and JAZZ illustrates this beautifully. From the Book Jacket In 1974 he was co-founder of the Essex Photographic Workshop, one of the most successful residential programs in photography in Essex, Massachusetts. Since then he has conducted workshops all over the world including ICP in New York and Gaudi School of Photography in Peru. He currently facilitates two critique groups in the Boston area with photographers who are working on long-term personal projects. He lives in Gloucester, Massachusetts with his wife and daughter and loves fly fishing for striped bass. |