Gay Block
Susan Rosenthal, Camp Pinecliffe, Maine / Susan Rosenthal Schwartz, Jenkintown, PA

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Images(4)

Artist Gay Block (American, born 1942)American, born 1942

CultureAmerican

Titles

Susan Rosenthal, Camp Pinecliffe, Maine / Susan Rosenthal Schwartz, Jenkintown, PA
from the series Camp Girls

Date1981, 2006, printed 2007

PlaceHarrison, Maine, United States, Camp Pinecliffe

PlaceJenkintown, Pennsylvania, United States

MediumInkjet prints

DimensionsImage (.A): 23 × 28 5/8 in. (58.4 × 72.7 cm)
Sheet (.A): 24 1/16 × 29 11/16 in. (61.1 × 75.4 cm)
Image (.B): 23 × 28 5/8 in. (58.4 × 72.7 cm)
Sheet (.B): 24 1/16 × 29 11/16 in. (61.1 × 75.4 cm)

Credit LineGift of the artist in honor of Anne Wilkes Tucker on the occasion of her retirement

Object number2015.205.A,.B

Not on view

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Department

Photography

Object Type

PHOTOGRAPHS

DescriptionIn 1981, Block returned to the summer camp she had attended in the 1950s to visit her daughter, who was finishing her seventh and last summer at Camp Pinecliffe. Interested in the girls and wondering what sorts of values were shared by such privileged campers, she asked permission to spend a week photographing them. Her concerns were quickly replaced by a fascination with the innocence and promise in the girls’ faces. She photographed them, thinking about the women they would become. Twenty-five years later, she tracked down, interviewed, and photographed many of them again. The new portraits were especially challenging; the women were most concerned about looking good. Block wanted to penetrate deeper, finally acknowledging, however, that for her subjects in their late thirties, the facade is critical.
ProvenanceThe artist, Santa Fe, New Mexico; given to MFAH, 2015.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks

Inscribed in pencil on sheet verso:
Susan Rosenthal, Camp Pinecliffe, Maine
1981/2007

Signed in pencil on sheet verso: Gay Block

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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