Lisa Brawn: MUMSHO

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Lisa Brawn, "MUMSHO," 2018

Opening Receptions: Friday, September, 14th 5 - 9 pm & Saturday,  September 15th 2 - 5 pm

Calgary Artwalk: Saturday, September 15th: 12 - 5 & Sunday, September, 16th 12-4pm

I have been collecting tintypes, cabinet cards, and old snapshots from flea markets, garage sales, and vintage shops for years, but by far my favourite type of photographs are photobooth self-portraits. I stopped adding to my own collection when I discovered hundreds of thousands of these on ebay, pinterest, flickr, etc. and I can spend days looking through, for free! While they are all interesting, about one in a hundred jump out as having captured an especially intriguing person at a fascinating moment. The subjects are not celebrities or socialites you’d find in Warhol silkscreens, just ordinary people with unknowable motivations for stepping into the photobooth that day. They might have simply been documenting a new hairdo! They are almost always unidentified, and their anonymity feels incongruous with the wealth of information captured in the moment. Rather than anonymous strangers, my sentimental preference is to relate to the women in the images as Aunties and Sisters and Moms. This year I decided that the world needs more portraits of women, and so I give you MUMSHO. - Lisa Brawn