Vintage in Print / Local Exhibition Highlight

Allen Ginsberg
W.S. Burroughs (W.S.B. in Egyptian Museum Exhibition)
1953; reprinted 1997
Gelatin silver print
Gift of Howard Greenberg
2004.038.045

Two photography exhibitions are opening next week at The Samuel Dorsky Museum New at SUNY Paltz that have me really excited. Beat and Beyond: Photographs by Allen Ginsberg & A Discerning Vision: Photographs from the Collection of Howard Greenberg will be on view from March 28-June 22. Since I was a teenager I have been reading great works by the beat generation talents. Burroughs and Kerouac changed the way I looked at the world. On the Road & Dharma Bums helped encourage me to travel the country with only a backpack, a few dollars and the desire to exist in the present moment, be up for anything, and not worry about my future. It amounted to some of the best times of my life. Ginsberg's portrayal of this generation through his photographs and text is hypnotizing. Who better to document this culture than the man that helped to conceive it.


The other exhibition at Dorsky celebrates 25 years of the Howard Greenberg Gallery. I cannot help but be very affectionate toward this because Howard Greenberg founded the Center for Photography at Woodstock in 1977. It is because of his vision that we exist. Every day we work very hard to maintain our mission in which he helped to create. Thank you Howard and Happy 25!

Saul Leiter
Untitled, New York, c.1950
Gelatin silver print; printed c.1950
Signed in ink on print verso
Courtesy of Howard Greenberg

The opening reception will take place on Saturday March 29.