Categories:
This exhibition of more than 50
photographs and photographic montages, drawn from the artist’s studio and the
Menil collection and spanning the period 1962 to the present, traces the
fascinating and wide-ranging evolution of the career of New York- and New
Mexico-based Danny Lyon. A leading and explosively creative figure in the
American street photography movement of the 1960s, Lyon distinguished himself
from peers like Robert Frank, Garry Winogrand, and Lee Friedlander through his
direct engagement with his subjects and his concern for those on the margins of
society. His goal at the outset of his career, he says, was “to destroy Life
magazine” by presenting powerful, real alternatives to the hollow pictures and
stories permeating American mass media in that era of conformity. In the
process he created thousands of images of striking psychological, political,
and aesthetic power.
The exhibition is organized by the Menil Collection, Houston. At the Menil
Collection, this exhibition was realized through the generous support of
Michael Zilkha, David and Anne Kirkland, Mark Wawro and Melanie Gray, H-E-B,
the Robert Mapplethorpe Foundation, and the City of Houston.
Danny Lyon
Santa Barbara Museum of Art
1130 State Street, Santa Barbara, CA 93101
