Michal Chelbin: Photographer @ the Library

As part of the Photographer @ the Library lecture series, Aperture and the New York Public Library are pleased to announce a special talk and book signing with acclaimed Israeli artist Michal Chelbin who will discuss the work from her first monograph. Strangely Familiar: Acrobats, Athletes, and Other Traveling Troupes (Aperture, 2008) features richly detailed, internally charged portraits of small town performers in circuses and other traveling troupes taken over a period of six years in the Ukraine, Russia, Israel and England. Chelbin’s most frequent subjects are children and adolescents, yet her work encompasses a mix of generations. Often captured in performance costumes, Chelbin’s palette is intense, with a distinctive use of saturated pinks, blues, and greens. Her black-and-white images, which are intermingled throughout the book, have an almost Pictorialist richness. Though her influences are evident—most notably August Sander and Diane Arbus—the photographs in Strangely Familiar have a unique visual and emotional impact. Michal Chelbin (born in Haifa, Israel, 1974) has lived in Brooklyn since 2006. Her work has appeared in solo shows in Los Angeles, New York and more recently in Israel at the Tel Aviv Museum of Art as well as in group shows internationally. She is represented by Andrea Meislin Gallery, New York.