Not Your Grandmother’s Snapshots

HERE ARE SOME SNAPSHOTS for your Thursday.

Stranger Than Strange

(Above) Multiple Exposures, c. 1960s - 1970s.

(Above) Family Faces Apparition, c. 1930s
(Above) Lonely Chair, c. 1940s
(Above) Ghoul and TV, c. 1930s
(Above) Creepy Clown, c. 1910s
(Above) Cross Dresser, c. 1940s
(Above) Pet Funeral, c. 1960s


ANONYMOUS PHOTOGRAPHS CAN BE STRANGE, mainly because we have little to no context in which to benchmark our understanding of what we are looking at. Here are a few odd ducks from the Accidental Mysteries collection of found, anonymous snapshots.

Accidental Mysteries to Open at Wake Forest

(Above) Peabody Essex Museum; Salem, Mass. 2007 - 2008

(Above) South Shore Arts; Munster, Indiana 2008

(Above) Anonymous photo, collection of Accidental Mysteries.

(Above) Anonymous photo, collection of Accidental Mysteries.

(Above) The Art Museum of the University of Memphis; Memphis, TN 2006

(Above) Intuit: The Center for Intuitive and Outsider Art; Chicago, IL 2006

(Above) The Sheldon Art Galleries; Saint Louis, Missouri 2006

(Above) The DeVos Art Museum, Northern Michigan University; Marquette, MI 2008


WAKE FOREST UNIVERSITY, IN MY HOMETOWN OF WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. will be the 7th venue to host the traveling exhibition “Accidental Mysteries: Extraordinary Vernacular Photographs.” The exhibition opens at the Charlotte and Phillip Hanes Art Gallery on October 22 and runs through December 9, 2009.

I will be giving a talk on Thursday, October 29 at 3 pm in Room 9 of the Art Center. Learn more here. The university press release is also available.

The opening reception is Friday, October 30, from 5 pm to 7 pm. If you have never visited the Accidental Mysteries website, you can visit by simply clicking here.

If any AM blog readers are in the area, I would love to meet you.

If your museum or university art gallery would like to know how this exhibition can come to you, please e-mail me at: fosterdesign (at) charter.net.