Amani Willett

Disquiet
in conversation with Marvin Heiferman

Wednesday, November 6, 2013, 7pm
Free admission. Seating is very limited.
Q & A to follow the discussion.
Copies of Disquiet, published by Damiani, will be available for sale and for signing by the artist after the talk.

Please join us for a conversation between photographer Amani Willett and author and curator Marvin Heiferman. The two will discuss work from Willett’s first monograph, Disquiet (Damiani, 2013) in which Heiferman contributed an essay.

Disquiet, a metaphoric journey that examines the first two years in the life of the photographer’s son, weaves intimate family pictures with images of political and economic turbulence in American society between 2010 and 2012. Relying on a comprehensive visual approach, including environmental portraiture, landscapes, still lifes and news images, Disquiet creates a multi-layered story of beauty, tenderness and unease. The cinematic images form a narrative arc in which the photographer’s sense of anxiety is palpable. The book brings the viewer on a journey that seamlessly shifts from public to private spaces—in one spread, the clouds of tear-gas smoke from a Occupy Wall Street demonstration fill the frame; and a few pages later, we see a spread of the photographer’s pregnant wife staring out the window tentatively. Disquiet is a striking visual interpretation of one person’s experience that is sure to resonate with the experiences of many.

About Amani Willett & Marvin Heiferman

Amani Willett is a Brooklyn-based photographer. In 2012 he received his MFA in Photography, Video and Related Media at the School of Visual Arts where he received the Alice Beck Odette scholarship and was named commencement speaker. He holds a BA in American Studies from Wesleyan University. Willett’s work has been featured in the books Street Photography Now (Thames and Hudson) and New York: In Color (Abrams) and in publications Newsweek, American Photography and The New York Times. He is a long-term member of the iN-PUBLiC collective of photographers. His pictures have been exhibited both nationally and internationally, including at the Howard Greenberg Gallery, New York and the Center for Urban Photography, Stockholm, Sweden. His website is www.amaniwillett.com.

Marvin Heiferman, a curator and writer, has organized major exhibitions for the Museum of Modern Art, The Smithsonian Institution, The Whitney Museum of American Art, The International Center of Photography, MoMA PS1, and The New Museum.