MOPA

I had the pleasure of seeing “State of Mind: A California Invitational” a photography exhibit on display at the Museum of Photographic Arts located in Balboa Park in San Diego, in addition to their permanent collection. The show is a celebration of California photography in the 21^st century. Although the artists reside in a similar geographic location, the photographs varied vastly. From portraits of mini beauty queens, to the classic female nude; from landscapes to lynchings. Todd Hido created a series called A Road Divided, in which he took pictures of landscapes as he was traveling through a rainy car door window creating an eerie and hazy feel appropriate for the weather he was depicting. In the erased lynching series, Ken Gonzales Day took old photographs of lynchings and erased the victim. I speculated that the photos were meant to problematise the viewer by placing the viewer amongst the perpetrators. Susan Anderson created High Glitz, a series of portraits of young beauty queens, in full make up and dress. These photos are unedited and are meant to draw attention to how these young girls are made up to emulate more mature expectations for beauty. Overall, the show had great variety from photographs meant to capture unlikely moments of beauty to photos that confront social issues.