In November 2022, my photographic partner Iango Henzi and I were preparing a special piece on Madonna for Vanity Fair Europe. She had a world tour coming up and we wanted to do something artistic and interesting, something with meaning. Originally we considered a re-imagining of The Last Supper but with just Madonna all alone. We wanted to go further, though. For every shoot we work on, we start with a reference then research, develop and evolve. Working with Madonna, we give her references, a plan, and she will come back and say: “What about doing it this way?” It’s an exchange. We always want to examine the meaning of a picture – what emotion it evokes and what it says.

The references from paintings, including those by Botticelli, came in later. We asked Madonna and some of the other women to dye their hair for the shoot because we wanted rich red Botticelli tones. There is also a reference to La Grande Bouffe, a French movie from the 1970s. We wanted the feeling of decadence, a huge feast. Madonna is generally involved in casting decisions but here she trusted me and Iango. We were searching for people whose faces were reminiscent of paintings by old masters, but we also wanted to be very inclusive. All the people in the picture are women but we wanted every kind of woman, including transgender women.

We live in a society where there is an excess of everything. This picture gives an idea of the bacchanalia. The wine stains and messy plates felt important. Our lives are a mess – had the scene been pristine, that would not have represented life. We also used a particular lens for a distorted look and a feeling of chaos. It gives the image more reality and depth.

We chose the food very particularly, picking certain fruits and breads for their lusciousness and decadence. Madonna opened the bread and it disintegrated into powder and crumbs, but the idea of her breaking the bread is not referencing Jesus. It was more about her sharing with people. We live in a world where society can be very selfish. Photographs usually show Madonna alone, but she has been like a mother to many people. Our image was symbolic – to have this icon of pop culture sharing with the others was a moment of unity, motherhood and inclusiveness.

Body language is very important in our pictures. There’s a sense of freedom and a sensuality in the women’s movements. The connection between them was very organic and the energy was intense. Madonna seems to guide it. All the women felt it: it was almost like a theatrical performance.

Iango and I first met about 10 years ago in Paris. I used to do hairstyling for photoshoots. Iango was doing photography but he was also a dancer. When we met, we had a feeling that we wanted to create photographic pieces: to study, to train ourselves, to discuss ideas and to search for truth.

We work together as Luigi & Iango. We are partners in photography and we are married for life. It’s a union in everything. Many people think it must be difficult for a married couple to work together but that’s not our experience. We often alternate roles. Sometimes one of us has a strong idea, and the other will follow it.

We’ve done more than 300 covers for Vogue, and worked with Vanity Fair, ID, Dust, Chaos, W and other magazines. We’ve done a lot of work with very famous supermodels, actors and singers including Cate Blanchett, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Penélope Cruz, Pedro Almodóvar, Cher, Rihanna and Marina Abramović.

We love women’s bodies – there is a certain poetry to their shapes – and there are many nudes in our work. There is a beautiful image of Precious Lee, a famous Plus-Size model, in our book. When we took that nude it was very spontaneous. After we shot it, I saw tears in her eyes. She saw herself so appreciated and beautiful. The people we’ve photographed trust us completely. Our nudes are never vulgar – they’re always tasteful and soft.

I don’t want to be provocative with photography. But I do want to search and discover. I want to approach a subject with depth and meaning. To me, this kind of searching as we go through the world is about knowledge – and knowledge becomes art.

Luigi Murenu’s CV

Born: Cagliari, Sardinia, Italy
Trained: Self-taught
Influences: “Man Ray, George Platt Lynes, Irving Penn, Robert Mapplethorpe”
High point: “Our first solo exhibition, at Palazzo Reale in Milan, Italy”
Low point: “A dangerous storm destroyed the roof of our printer office and all our prints and tests were water-damaged”
Top tip: “Find your own path following the unconscious. Follow your instincts and put the same value, passion and determination into everything you do.”

EDMONDS, Wash. – October 18, 2023 – ( Newswire.com )

Full Light and Perfect Shadow: The Photography of Chao-Chen Yang is the first solo exhibition and study of the art and life of Chao Chen Yang (1909–1969), an important Seattle photographer who gained national prominence in the mid-20th century. The exhibition runs Nov. 8, 2023, through Feb. 11, 2024, at Cascadia Art Museum.

Born in Hangzhou, China, Yang received his art training at the University of Hsin-Hwa in Shanghai. After graduating, he became the Art Director for the Government Institute of Nanking. In 1933, he moved to Chicago as Chancellor of the Chinese Consulate and attended the Art Institute of Chicago. Initially trained as a painter, he later used photography as his main medium for artistic expression. In 1938, Yang was transferred to Seattle as Chancellor of the Chinese Consulate and became actively involved with the Seattle Photographic Society. Besides his own career, he was an influential art and photography instructor and worked tirelessly to advance Chinese culture in the United States.

Yang won numerous awards in important photography salons and became a Fellow of The Photographic Society of America, the Professional Photographers Association of America, and the Royal Photographic Society of Great Britain. He was a pioneer in color photography in the Northwest in both advertising and the fine arts.

The exhibition will be accompanied by a book written by our curator David F. Martin: 159 pages and profusely illustrated. Published by Cascadia Art Museum and distributed by the University of Washington Press.

David F. Martin is Curator for Cascadia Art Museum and is the leading authority on early Washington State art and artists. He has pioneered the study of Northwest women, Japanese and Chinese Americans, LGBTQ+, and other minorities who had established national and international artistic reputations during the period 1890–1960. His numerous publications have focused on regional painting, printmaking, sculpture, and photography.

Cascadia Art Museum

190 Sunset Ave. S., Edmonds, WA 98020 

(425) 336-4809

www.cascadiaartmuseum.org

Wednesday–Sunday: 11 a.m.-5 p.m.

Art Walk Edmonds: Third Thursdays, 5-8 p.m. – FREE

Current Exhibitions: https://www.cascadiaartmuseum.org/current-exhibitions/

Contact Information:

Carol Gordon

Marketing/Development Manager

carol@cascadiaartmuseum.org

4256786530

Press Release Service by Newswire.com

Original Source: ‘Full Light and Perfect Shadow: The Photography of Chao-Chen Yang’ First Solo Exhibition Comes to Cascadia Art Museum

Saher Alghorra has long loved to document both the beauty and challenges of life in Gaza. That’s what first drove the 27-year-old Gaza native to become a photojournalist. But even Alghorra—who has already lived through the devastating 2008 and 2014 Gaza-Israel conflicts—was not prepared for what has transpired this month. “The humanitarian situation here is extremely catastrophic,” Alghorra tells TIME.

Hamas launched a surprise, unprecedented attack on Oct. 7 that killed at least 1,400 people in Israel. Gazans have been subject to thousands of airstrikes since then and Israel has enacted a total siege covering electricity, water, food, and medicine, which comes on top of a 16-year blockade that already left most Gazans reliant on aid. More than 3,300 people have died in Gaza in this latest escalation, and more than 13,000 wounded, the Palestinian Health Minister said on Wednesday.

(Warning: Some of the following images are graphic in nature and might be disturbing to some viewers.)

Child casualties make up a quarter of the total, Gaza authorities told Reuters, and Alghorra’s photos put those numbers in stark relief. In one, Omar Lafi mourns the loss of his nephew, with whom he was inside a market buying food when the nearby Al-Sousi Mosque in Gaza’s Al-Shati refugee camp, set up in 1948, was hit by an airstrike. On a separate occasion, Alghorra recalls, he saw a father holding his daughter near Al-Shifa hospital, exclaiming that he was planning to throw her a birthday party, before she was killed by an airstrike.

At least 700 children have died in Gaza since the Israel-Hamas war broke out. To grasp how deadly the conflict has been so far for Gaza’s children, more died there in the first nine days of conflict than in 20 months of Russia’s war in Ukraine.

And those who live have not escaped the trauma. Alghorra recalls meeting two children at the emergency room at Al-Quds hospital who had lost their father while escaping airstrikes. “They sat there crying. We tried to help find [him],” he says. Alghorra followed them until they finally found him injured in a different part of the hospital. “They hugged each other and collapsed in tears.”

Alghorra’s photographs show how Israeli airstrikes continue to overwhelm the 2.2 million Palestinians living in what is one of the world’s most densely populated places. Families grieve next to lifeless bodies. Plumes of smoke fill the sky. Rubble fills the streets. Patients inundate Al-Shifa, the city’s largest medical complex, as thousands more seek shelter there. Homes are destroyed every day. “They are reduced to dismembered bodies inside,” he says.

Read More: For Gazans, There Are No Safe Havens

Amid the scale of death and destruction, health officials have resorted to storing bodies in ice cream freezer trucks, as cemeteries fill up and moving them to hospital becomes too risky.

In another photograph, a mother, already injured after her house in Gaza was hit by an airstrike the morning of Oct. 9, cries as she learns that her daughter Mira Abu Ghneima has died. “We see sadness and frustrations in the eyes of the citizens who lose their loved ones during the war,” Alghorra says. “There are families that have perished entirely.”

“The health situation is at risk of collapse,” Alghorra says. His photographs from Al-Shifa hospital illustrate the urgency on the ground. “There were emotionally difficult scenes that took a toll on us,” he says. “It’s a difficult feeling, and the smell isn’t good. I went to the Shifa Hospital to capture images of suffering and sadness there, and all the sounds were chants and ululations…There were many sounds of crying and screaming.”

The carnage in Gaza even pushed BBC Arabic reporter Adnan El-Bursh to tears on Thursday as he and cameraman Mahmoud al-Ajrami discovered friends, relatives, and neighbors were among those killed or injured at Al-Shifa. The hospital has warned that there is nowhere else to go for patients to go. “It’s absolutely impossible to evacuate the hospital,” Dr. Muhammad Abu Salima, the director of the hospital, told the New York Times. “If someone doesn’t die from the bombardment, then he’ll die from the lack of medical service.”

Read More: How to Help Victims of Israel-Hamas War

Israel on Oct. 13 ordered the evacuation of more than 1 million Palestinians from northern to southern Gaza, ahead of an expected ground offensive. Israel says the measure—which the U.N. has said is “impossible”—is meant to protect civilian lives. But the U.N. and others have warned it would cause a “humanitarian disaster.”

The war has also been deadly for Alghorra’s peers. At least 17 journalists have been killed since the conflict broke out. Even so, he remains determined to continue his work. “We are all at risk here, but we follow safety guidelines regardless. This includes wearing press vests and moving cautiously based on our assessment of dangerous areas,” he says, showing TIME his press attire.

“Photography is very important for documenting crucial moments,” he says. “In this war, our role as photojournalists is to show the world what the Palestinian people are going through.”