Artist-Led Tour of "ENCORE" Photo Exhibit w/ Mark S. Kornbluth

Tour Highlights:

• View newly released and never-before-seen photographs from Kornbluth’s original theater portrait series, DARK
• Discover what inspired Kornbluth to take dozens of images of each structure from the deserted streets and to return night after night until certain he had captured all he needed
• Explore the relationship between the urban environment and the people who inhabit it (notice how not a single figure appears in Kornbluth’s theater images, yet they are deeply human)
• Hear from the artist himself and learn how Kornbluth finds his inspiration in the silent spaces, the dead of night, and the interstitial moments, allowing us to see the unseen, encounter one another in unexpected ways, and consider our environments anew

About this Event:

Five years after the start of Broadway’s Great Intermission—the 18-month period when the Covid pandemic forced theaters to close—ENCORE is a reprise of Mark S. Kornbluth’s 2023 solo exhibition of his historic portrait series DARK, featuring beloved photographs from the original collection as well as several new releases on view for the first time.

The series comprises of large-format photographs of Broadway theaters that quickly became symbols of the resilience of New York City, and a poetic tribute to the power of the arts for healing and human connection. While the buildings themselves awaited the return of actors and audiences, Kornbluth saw the opportunity to shift the spotlight to these sentinels of Times Square, many of them architectural marvels who play understudy to the incredible talents they house. Kornbluth took his photographs at night, with streetlights serving as stagecraft, and theater signage as dialogue. There are no passersby in the images, but each artwork nevertheless comes alive with its own sort of humanity. Kornbluth succeeds in capturing the presence of absence, and in doing so, reflects a shared and profound experience. Trained as a professional actor, with close friends affected by the unprecedented interruption of live performances, Kornbluth began the series as his own artistic homage to the age-old mantra “the show must go on.”

Theaters depicted in ENCORE include Ambassador, Barrymore, Belasco, Booth, Kerr, Lyceum, Lunt-Fontanne, Music Box, New Amsterdam, Radio City Music Hall, Shubert, and more. Broadway productions include legendary shows such as Chicago, Moulin Rouge, The Music Man, and West Side Story. The large-format photographs, printed as dye sublimations on aluminum, are immersive and luminous testaments to the grandeur and indomitable spirit of New York. This is an encore performance not to be missed.

About Mark S. Kornbluth:

Born in San Francisco in 1966, Mark Stephen Kornbluth was raised in Montreal, then Cleveland. Since graduating high school, Mark has lived in Toronto (twice), Los Angeles, Westchester County (also twice), and New York City, where he has resided since 2002. While the artist retains a natural wanderlust, the Manhattan skyline—whether seen from land or air—is his touchstone, New York City providing a wellspring of inspiration and an artistic community in which he thrives. 

Mark will tell you that he has always had a camera with him, for as long as he can remember, but that for much of his life, he was an artist in search of a medium. As a teen he secured an internship as a production assistant, converted that to an assistant stage manager role through ambition, a keen mind, and an infectious energy, and spent ten years in the theatrical arts—touring Broadway shows around the country, and working in film and television. Mark has studied a range of academic disciplines including art history, literature, psychology, and art therapy. It is no surprise then that his dramatic talents, wandering intellect, and insatiable curiosity find a home in the work of a fine art photographer. At once he is screenwriter, stage manager, director, and producer, an explorer of his world through the lens.

Mark holds an M.F.A. in acting from Sarah Lawrence College, where he studied with such greats as photographer Joel Sternfeld, actor and director Paul Austin, and dancer and choreographer Sara Rudner. His oeuvre spans fine art, commercial, documentary, and event photography. A diverse academic and professional background helps to define his unobtrusive and unique approach to creating images. In his career to date, Mark has photographed dancers, musicians, actors, politicians, writers, and everyday people.

DARK, Mark S. Kornbluth’s series of photographs of Broadway theaters during the pandemic lockdown, represents a new chapter for the artist. When circumstances turned his attention from portraiture and human interactions to desolate streets and shuttered buildings, he became an insightful observer of the presence of absence, of the way that people leave their marks on the urban environment and vice versa, a practiced listener in the silences. Now when Times Square is teeming with life once again, Mark still seeks out the lonely hours of night, the interstitial moments, the darkness, and the quiet, creating meditative photographs that speak volumes.