Allen

Inscriptions

Dedicated, titled, dated, and signed, in ink, bottom center: For Trevor Fairbrother Allen Ginsberg / Boston Museum of Fine Arts 10/3/90 via Ellie D. Inscribed, in ink, bottom center: Allen Allen Ginsberg November 6, 1986 Dorfman.; on reverse: printed, in ink, center: ALLEN / NOVEMBER 6, 1986 / I took this portrait of Allen Ginsberg on November 6, 1986 / on the Polaroid 40x80 camera at the Museum of Fine Arts / in Boston. I was assisted by Polaroid large-format master / Peter Bass and photographer Allen Hess. They sat inside / the camera with the film while I stood outside on a three / foot high box next to the lens with the lens cap in one / hand and a cable release in the other. (The 40x80 camera / is actually a room about the size of an efficient kitchen.) / Allen Ginsberg stood about seven feet from me on the / covered platform of a forklift. / Since February 1980 I have made several portraits of Allen / naked on the smaller, but still large, 20x24 Polaroid camera. / We have a long history of friendship dating back to July / 1959 in NYC. (I began making portraits of Allen with a / borrowed Hasselblad on November 10, 1965 at the Grolier / Book Shop in Cambridge, MA.) This time Allen was in / Boston to celebrate the publication of WHITE SHROUD / and to give a benefit reading for Oxfam America at / Suffolk University. / The 40x80 portrait of Allen was first exhibited by Brent / Sikkema at Vistion Gallery, Boston, September 30 to / October 29, 1988, in the exhibit “Family Living Can Go / On Existing,” which Allen and I shared. / My 40x80 portrait of Allen was rephotographed by Allen / Hess. That 8x10 negative was printed under my supervision / at Zona Photographic Laboratories, Cambridge, MA by / Rowena Otremba. The custom UF-3 plexiglass frame was / designed by Van Wood at SMALLCORP, Greenfield, MA. / This label was designed and printed by John Kristensen at / Firefly Press, Somerville, MA. This edition is published by / Brent Sikkema Fine Art, New York. / ELSA DORFMAN; dedicated and signed, in ink, bottom right: For T.F. / Elsa / Dorfman

Provenance

The artist; given to Trevor Fairbrother and John T. Kirk, Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, October 3, 1990; given to present collection, 2011.

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Subjects