Matthew Connors: General Assembly

Light Work presents Queens-based artist Matthew Connors’ General Assembly.  This exhibition comprises 650 portraits that span the first year of Occupy Wall Street (OWS) in New York City. An expansive project that pairs individual black and white portraits within a tightly formatted grid, General Assembly borrows its title from the movement’s term for its horizontal decision-making process. Connors made these black-and-white  portraits in the charged atmosphere of Zuccotti Park,  elsewhere in New York City at direct actions and during more contemplative moments before and after working group meetings. Connors’ exhibition will be on view in the Kathleen O. Ellis Gallery from August 24 through October 15, 2020. Light Work will host a virtual artist talk with Matthew Connors, Friday, September 25, 2020 at 5:00 p.m. EST. Copies of Connors’ exhibition catalog, Contact Sheet 208, are available in the Light Work Shop. 

*We have temporarily closed the Kathleen O. Ellis Gallery to the general public as part of our commitment to helping flatten the COVID-19 curve. We encourage you to visit Light Work exhibitions online and to check out our catalog of artist videos, including an interview with exhibiting artist Matthew Connors.

ABOUT GENERAL ASSEMBLY

When Matthew Connors first arrived at Zuccotti Park in September of 2011, he had no intention of making photographs. He first gravitated to the congregation of protesters who occupied Manhattan’s Financial District out of simple curiosity. But as he observed Occupy Wall Street’s “wellspring of generative social organization,” he wondered how photography could contribute to the historical moment before him. Disturbed by the way that passersby were photographing protesters at a distance, he immersed himself in the activity of the movement and sought to use his camera as a tool of engagement. 

The process of creating the portraits involved lengthy conversations with the participants about their motivations and involvement in the movement. Building on these newly formed relationships, he regularly returned to demonstrations to photograph and offer each person he photographed a print of their portrait. For Connors, this ongoing exchange of images and ideas contributed to the “relational fabric” that Occupy was cultivating. In many of these portraits, the person gazes directly into the camera at the artist—and us—a rare and brave moment of trust and connection. A native New Yorker, Connors had begun to feel that his home was becoming a “city of strangers” pulled apart by gentrification’s economic power and frequent disruption. By distributing political power and reaching decisions more equitably, Occupy Wall Street sought to reestablish that community.

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Matthew Connors received a BA in English Literature from the University of Chicago and an MFA in Photography from Yale University. He has exhibited his work in galleries and museums worldwide, including DOX Centre for Contemporary Art in Prague, The Museum of Modern Art in New York, and the Storefront for Art and Architecture in New York. His awards include the Alice Kimball English Travelling Fellowship from the Yale School of Art (2004), the MacDowell Colony Fellowship (2010), the Virginia Center for Creative Arts Fellowship (2011), and the William Hicks Faculty Fellowship from the Massachusetts College of Art & Design (2012 and 2008). Since 2004 he has taught at the Massachusetts College of Art & Design in Boston, where he chairs the Photography Department.

RELATED PROGRAMMING
We are excited to announce In Solidarity: Syracuse Protests will be installed concurrently in Light Work’s Hallway gallery. Previously on view at Light Work’s Urban Video Project outdoor architectural projection site at the Everson Museum, this exhibition includes the work of five local photographers who documented protests in Syracuse: Cherilyn Beckles, Mylz Blake, Dennis Fernando, Eric Derachio Jackson Jr., and Maranie Staab. An apt coupling of exhibitions, each is in dialogue with the dynamics of social justice movements and the visual narratives they produce. 

  

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