Sade, (color), New York City 1983__© Janette Beckman, courtesy of FaheyKlein Gallery, Los Angeles and PACE Gallery, New York.jpg

Studio to Stage

Music Photography from the Fifties to the Present

Past
Jun 29 – Aug 19, 2022
New York

Exhibition Details:

Studio to Stage: Music Photography from the Fifties to the Present
Jun 29 – Aug 19, 2022

Gallery:

540 West 25th Street
New York

Press:

Press Release

Connect:

(opens in a new window) @pacegallery

Above: Janette Beckman, Sade, New York City, 1983 © Janette Beckman, courtesy of Fahey/Klein Gallery, Los Angeles and PACE Gallery, New York

Pace is pleased to present Studio to Stage, an exhibition of music photography by artists within and beyond the gallery’s program.

The show meditates on the evolution of music photography, exploring exchanges across different genres, eras, and geographic locations as part of an homage to the last century of music and the image-makers that documented it. The presentation features photography by Richard Avedon, Janette Beckman, Adam Cohen, Jem Cohen, Kevin Cummins, Rahim Fortune, Robert Frank, Hiro, Paul Graham, Peter Hujar, Ari Marcopoulos, Itzel Alejandra Martinez, Gordon Parks, Irving Penn, Rankin, Ming Smith, and Nick Waplington. The exhibition is curated by Mark Beasley, curatorial director of Pace Live.

Presented chronologically on the gallery’s first floor, the photographs in Studio to Stage, which have rarely been exhibited together, depict iconic musicians of the past 70 years—including Billie Holiday, Janis Joplin, David Bowie, Bob Dylan, John Cage, The Rolling Stones, The Smiths, Spice Girls, Beastie Boys, and more—and reflect the “radical continuum,” as termed by writer Simon Reynolds, of music. The photographs on view capture not only what it means to be a performer, but what it means to be a member of an audience.

Spanning early jazz, New York hip hop, British punk, European techno, and other musical movements, Studio to Stage examines the ways that photographers have helped cultivate mythologies around performers and their respective scenes. The legendary venues and audiences of the depicted concerts, festivals, and other performances are also key in the stories told in the photographs on view. Among the highlights in the exhibition are Smith’s photographs of jazz musicians, Marcopoulos’s images of the Beastie Boys and Iggy Pop, and Graham’s photographs of Berlin clubs and raves. Studio to Stage presents the history of music as a boundless and continuous coalescing of varied sounds and geographies. Amid today’s political and social polarization, the exhibition highlights music’s potential for cultivating connections and enactments of appreciation.

In addition to the photography presentation on the gallery’s first floor, the exhibition also comprises a video installation on the seventh floor, where albums related to the show will be mounted on the walls.

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Exhibition Film

Artist Roundtable: Studio to Stage

This new film features highlights from a recent conversation between Mark Beasley, curatorial director of Pace Live and curator of Studio to Stage, and artists Janette Beckman, Itzel Alejandra Martinez, and Nick Waplington, all of whom are showing work in the exhibition. Here, Beckman, Martinez, and Waplington discuss the histories of their practices and unforgettable experiences photographing musicians, concerts, and scenes at various points in their careers.