A center for the documentary arts

We have a lot going on at Pattern this summer. Our first exhibition, Border Stories, opens this Thursday, and we have two more shows scheduled, with Terry Ratzlaff's The Watcher opening June 21st, and Guy Martin's Parallel State opening July 27th.

Border Stories Opening - Thursday 5/16 at 7 P.M.

Pattern's first exhibition looks at the Mexico–United States border by bringing two distinct bodies of work into conversation with one another.

Rachel Woolf’s Deported: An American Division focuses on one family. Lourdes Salazar Bautista had been living in Ann Arbor, Michigan for 20 years along with her three children, all born in the United States, when she was deported to Mexico. Lourdes, along with her two younger children, left Michigan soon after the deportation hearing in August 2017. Woolf’s project follows the Bautista family through this separation, exploring the impact of immigration policy on one family that is now divided by borders.

Elliot Ross’s American Backyard is a sweeping look at the 2,000-mile border. Through collected vignettes, the project aims to look at issues playing out in daily lives of those who live near the border. Beyond talk of the Trump wall, there is a larger, less transparent story to be told about these borderlands related to creolization, acculturation, habitat loss, surveillance and diversity.

In a moment when the national political climate is characterized by especially hyperbolic rhetoric about the Mexico–United States border, Border Stories begs a more compassionate and nuanced study of the issues embodied by this geographic feature.

Border Stories opens Thursday, May 16th at 7 P.M. RSVP here.

Rachel will be in conversation with immigration attorney Jocelyn Jenks, Esq., attorney with Colorado Legal Servcies' Human Trafficking Project, on the issues surrounding Deported: An American Division on Friday, May 31st at 7 P.M. RSVP here.

Elliot and his project collaborator, writer Genevieve Allison, will have a book launch for American Backyardon Friday, June 7th at 7 P.M. RSVP here.

Terry Ratzlaff: The Watcher Opening - Friday 6/21
at 7 P.M.

Craig Connell has been watching trains from the parking lot of The Old Mill in Lincoln, NE since 1983. He confessed he watched trains obsessively, without missing a day, for 11 years and 6 days. To Craig, trains symbolize the hands of a clock, dictating the passage of time. Over time, the act of seeing transforms into a structural mechanism, meant to re-integrate thought and action. The ritual of seeing functions alongside the ritual of notation. Over time the notations he makes are transmuted into analytic structure and organized chronologically. They become the direct physical object of Craig’s obsession with time.

Photographically, Terry Ratzlaff employs a similar approach. Through systematic repetition, he has constructed a ritualistic approach to making photographs of Craig watching trains. The process is routinized, disciplined, structured, and most similarly, obsessive. He acts as a mechanized collector, building a cache of images that appear homogeneous in nature, but because of the concept of time, every image represents static content within a renewed moment.

Ratzlaff is originally from Denver and is currently pursuing an MFA at the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. During the duration of the show, we will be hosting a book workshop and film screening with Ratzlaff. Details on these events will be coming soon. RSVP to the exhibition opening here.

Guy Martin : The Parallel State Opening - Saturday 7/27 at 7 P.M.

The Parallel State is a multi-layered project which began life as an examination of the Turkish soap opera and film industry, but evolved over the course of five years into a semi-fictional study of truth, reality and lies in contemporary Turkey. This blending of fact and fiction during a period that saw the rise of totalitarian rule in Turkey is deeply resonant to the experiences of contemporary American society.

Guy Martin is a London-based British photographer. This work was the recipient of the Project Launch grant from CENTER Sante Fe in 2014, was first shown at Les Rencontres d’Arles as a recipient of the New Discovery Award in 2017, and was published in book format by GOST last year. RSVP to the exhibition opening here.

During the weekend of the show, we will be hosting a book club dinner with Guy and a workshop on contemporary documentary practices. Details coming soon on both of these events.

Projections

Our next Pattern Projections is Thursday, June 6th, with drinks starting at 6 P.M. and projections starting at 7 P.M. Projections are hosted ever first Thursday as a time for folks to come and share what they have been working on. It can be long-term projects, ideas you are exploring or even just a recent assignment. You are welcome to share or to just come and hangout and see what others are up to. RSVP to Projections here.

And library open hours will continue through the summer every Sunday, from noon until 4 P.M. The library catalog can be found here. Please let us know if you are interested in volunteering to help with the open hours.

Hope to see you soon,

Benjamin Rasmussen, Pattern Co-Founder

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