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Jumprope

Photograph
1975 (photographed), 2004 (Printed)
Artist/Maker
Place of origin

Mark Cohen was born in 1943 in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, where he continued to live and work until recently moving to Philadelphia. His work was first exhibited at George Eastman House in 1969 and he had his first solo exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in 1973. He won Guggenheim Fellowships in 1971 and 1976 and a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in 1976. In 2013 his retrospective Dark Knees was shown at Le Bal, Paris and the Nederlands Fotomuseum, Rotterdam. Best known for his work in black and white, he also made a foray into colour with a series of dye-transfer prints in the 1970s.

Cohen literally shoots from the hip. He eschews the viewfinder and uses a wide-angle lens to a present a raw and fragmented vision of the working-class town of Wilkes-Barre. Blasts of flash add drama and a sense of movement. Cohen’s photographs share some features with the American street photographers who preceded him, such Garry Winogrand, Lee Friedlander and Diane Arbus, as well as earlier masters such as Henri Cartier-Bresson and Robert Frank, but his surrealist sensibility, at once elegant and off-kilter, humorous and slightly creepy, is his alone.


Object details

Category
Object type
TitleJumprope (assigned by artist)
Materials and techniques
Gelatin silver print, printed by the photographer from the 1970's negatives
Brief description
Photograph by Mark Cohen, 'Jumprope', Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, 1975, gelatin silver print. Printed in 2004 by the photographer from 1970’s negatives
Physical description
Black and white photograph of a girl using a skipping rope, cropped so that her body is visible from the neck to the knees. She wears a collared dress with sleeves to the elbow.
Dimensions
  • Sheet length: 32.7cm
  • Sheet width: 26cm
Styles
Marks and inscriptions
Inscribed on verso with artist's signature, title and date of image
Gallery label
Gallery 100, 2016-17: Mark Cohen (born 1943) ‘Jump Rope’, ‘Belly Button, Cartwheel’ 1975 Mark Cohen is a street photographer who has spent most of his life in the small town of Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Using a wide-angle lens and occasional blasts of flash, he presents the world as a series of fragments. He works quickly, moving close to his subjects and snapping without looking through the camera’s viewfinder, to create shots that vary from playful to sinister. Gelatin silver prints Museum nos. E.669, 673-2016
Credit line
Purchase funded by the Photographs Acquisition Group
Subjects depicted
Places depicted
Summary
Mark Cohen was born in 1943 in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, where he continued to live and work until recently moving to Philadelphia. His work was first exhibited at George Eastman House in 1969 and he had his first solo exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in 1973. He won Guggenheim Fellowships in 1971 and 1976 and a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship in 1976. In 2013 his retrospective Dark Knees was shown at Le Bal, Paris and the Nederlands Fotomuseum, Rotterdam. Best known for his work in black and white, he also made a foray into colour with a series of dye-transfer prints in the 1970s.

Cohen literally shoots from the hip. He eschews the viewfinder and uses a wide-angle lens to a present a raw and fragmented vision of the working-class town of Wilkes-Barre. Blasts of flash add drama and a sense of movement. Cohen’s photographs share some features with the American street photographers who preceded him, such Garry Winogrand, Lee Friedlander and Diane Arbus, as well as earlier masters such as Henri Cartier-Bresson and Robert Frank, but his surrealist sensibility, at once elegant and off-kilter, humorous and slightly creepy, is his alone.
Collection
Accession number
E.669-2016

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Record createdFebruary 10, 2016
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