Overview

In Barrio, photographer Paul D'Amato turned his lens to the largely Mexican-American Chicago neighborhoods of Pilsen and the Little Village, capturing their residents' homes and lives in multifaceted, dynamic images of weddings and graffiti artists, street corners and empty lots, and the euphoria of fire hydrants turned would-be baptismal fonts in the blistering summer sun. With We Shall-a companion volume to the DePaul Art Museum exhibition of D'Amato's photographs-D'Amato broadens his scope to include communities on Chicago's west side. Through emotionally charged portraits and richly layered interior views, the fifty-four color photographs of We Shall share with us D'Amato's genuine and complex perspective on life in some of the most challenging and troubled neighborhoods in the nation. D'Amato's technique is unique. He works with his subjects to forge a collaborative approach, and the resulting portraits and urban landscapes offer a contemporary take on the complexities of documentary photography and representation, all the more real and evocative for the intimacy between the photographer and the photographed. Sometimes inspiring, sometimes troubling, but always beautiful, the photographs of We Shall shine light on some of Chicago's most overlooked communities and are sure to captivate followers of Chicago-based art and urban photography alike.

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Reviews

Just as the truth is spoken in jest, the way we sit for the camera both reveals and conceals. It's indicative of how we really appear and how we wish to appear. And when you add to that what we as viewers bring to the photo--seeing it through our own lenses of what we know or think we know about that person and the factors that shape that life--looking at a portrait becomes a complex interaction. This truth seems inescapable when encountering 'We Shall'. . . . Nearly a decade ago, D'Amato took his camera to the Chicago's West Side, where he began photographing residents and the place they call home. For him, every encounter is a two-way street. . . . While D'Amato's motive is more artistic than documentary, a creative act rather than social activism, he allows that these images can be more than pretty pictures. --Thomas Connors, on the exhibition Splash, Chicago Sun-Times

Author Information

Paul D'Amato is professor of photography at Columbia College Chicago. His photographs have been featured in the New York Times Magazine, DoubleTake, and Harper's, among other publications, and are held in the collections of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

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