PHOTOGRAPHS PRESENT AND PAST
May 6 - September 4, 2000
Observed: Photographs Present and Past, an exhibition of 45 stunning
large format color and black-and-white photographs, opened on May
6, 2000, in the Akeley Gallery at the American Museum of Natural History.
On view through September 4, the images offer visitors a look at contemporary
life in Mongolia as well as a glimpse of Mongolian culture in the
early 20th century, providing insight into the tenacity of Mongol
Culture and the nomad way of life over the past eighty years.
The 35 contemporary photographs in the exhibition are the result of
five separate expeditions to Mongolia conducted since 1994 by writer,
photographer, and naturalist Robert McCracken Peck. Dr. Peck, a fellow
of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, traveled throughout
the country, seeking out families and individuals who are carrying
on their cultural traditions.
Dr.
Peck's photographs of modern-day Mongolia are contrasted with 10 black-and-white
images taken by members of several Museum expeditions to Mongolia
led by famed explorer Roy Chapman Andrews in the 1920s. The expedition
photographs, chosen from the Museum's archives, document Mongolia
at a moment of transition, just before it was absorbed into the Soviet
sphere. A decade of research by a Museum team of zoologists, geologists,
paleontologists, botanists, herpetologists, ichthyologists, cartographers,
and photographers offered major insights into a region that, until
then, had only been crudely mapped and never scientifically explored.
Mongolia Observed: Photographs Present and Past, which is curated
at the Museum by Laurel Kendall, curator in the Division of Anthropology,
and guest-curated by Robert McCracken Peck, sheds light on everyday
lives of the people of Mongolia, focusing on three themes important
in Mongolian culture: Nomadism, religion, and Naadam, the Mongolian
national festival that includes competitions in wrestling, horse racing,
and archery. Nomadic life is revealed through striking portraits,
photographs of families living in traditional Gers, or large
tents, and images of common day-to-day activities. Religious life
is portrayed through pictures of Buddhist monks and temples, and shaman
rituals still practiced in Mongolia today. Scenes from a Naadam tournament
show fierce competitors and spectators enjoying the rich social life
that has revolved around Mongolia's most important cultural event,
celebrated for centuries.
Through the vivid photographs on view in Mongolia Observed: Photographs
Present and Past, Museum visitors will be able to experience what
Roy Chapman Andrews and Robert McCracken Peck so carefully recorded.
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