EVENT

Snap! Orlando present the east coast premiere of “The Van Gogh Affect”, an exhibition addressing the artist’s profound and ever-present influence on contemporary perceptions of the world.
Simultaneously contemplating and reaffirming Van Gogh’s resounding posthumous influence over art & culture of the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries — award-winning photographers Lynn Johnson and Patricia Lanza offer evocative insight into Vincent’s uniquely sensitive lived experience of place and light.

Traveling in Van Gogh’s footsteps, Lynn Johnson and Patricia Lanza have conjured hauntingly intimate images in black & white [Johnson] and impressionist-imbued color [Lanza] in their exploration of Van Gogh’s quest to master the use of color as he studied, tracked and paid tribute to his most enduring muse— the sun.

Working in collaboration with the Saint-Paul Asylum in Saint-Rémy, Johnson & Lanza were granted special access in their retracing of Van Gogh’s time spent in the still-functioning sanitarium and the village of Auvers-sur-Oise where he died under mysterious circumstances in July of 1890.

The exhibition begins with visual material, many of which have never been seen, that was created by Lynn Johnson for National Geographic Magazine almost 25 years ago. As authors and photographers, Lynn Johnson and Patricia Lanza added new images that address Van Gogh’s quest to understand color, with their recent work created in France and the Netherlands in 2018 and 2019 shedding light on some of the controversy that has been written about, but never addressed creatively in visual form, such as the places he lived, worked, traveled and died.

Lynn Johnson is recognized globally for her artistry in photographing the human condition. A regular contributor to National Geographic, with more than 37 stories to her credit, Johnson is a twice-recognized Pulitzer Prize Finalist—first, in 2017 for the National Geographic “Gender Identity” story, and then again in 2019 for her National Geographic feature, “Face Transplant.”

“We are all artists and, in some way, identify with this eccentric man whose paintings grace everything from the secret spaces of elite collectors to the walls of museums and your favorite coffee cup. His art is both spectacular and accessible: Van Gogh makes us believe we too can be artists.”
— Lynn Johnson

Patricia Lanza is an American photographer and photo curator who has traveled to over 53 countries on assignment to document some of the most compelling people, nature, cultures and stories of our time. Lanza began her career as a staff photo editor working with Nat-Geo’s vast archive, her position evolved to full-time contract photographer. Then, as the Director of Talent and Content and Exhibitions for the Annenberg Space for Photography in Los Angeles from 2009 to 2017, Lanza curated and developed twenty-two exhibitions from concept to installation.

“Traveling and working in France fostered one of the most prolific periods of Van Gogh’s life. In a very short time, he produced hundreds of oil paintings and drawings, indeed some of his finest masterpieces were created between 1884 and 1890. Following in Van Gogh's footsteps, the route of the sun, I sought to capture with a camera what Van Gogh dreamed on canvas.”
— Patricia Lanza

Thank you Orange Appeal Magazine, Orlando Magazine, Bungalower, Orlando Sentinel and Patrick Connolly, Orlando Weekly and Jessica Bryce Young, for the insightful feature on ‘The Van Gogh Affect’ exhibition.

Another thank you to NPR/ 90.7 WMFE for sharing the in-depth conversation with executive director Patrick Kahn about Snap! Orlando’s ‘The Van Gogh Affect’ exhibition and the challenges of running a gallery during the pandemic.