Barbara Mensch is a fine art photographer who probes her subject matter with the curiosity of a detective. Born in Brooklyn, New York, she attended classes at the Brooklyn Museum Studio School, the Art Students League, and Hunter College, where she earned a scholarship to study in Florence, Italy. She then worked as an illustrator at Ms. Magazine and photographed inventory at Knoedler Gallery. As she evolved into a photographer, Mensch was drawn to the retreat of the darkroom and intrigued by translating tonalities in the fine print, rooted in her background in drawing.
In her early work, she explored unconventional ways of shooting with the Polaroid SX70 and exhibiting sequential imagery on tables or the ground. These early works were exhibited at P.S.1, The Kitchen, and The Los Angeles Institute of Contemporary Art. Her images have been included in publications such as Photography: The Problematic Model, The New York Times, The New Yorker, Exposure Magazine, and others. Her monographs include two books on New York’s legendary Fulton Market, New York Photographs, In The Shadow Of Genius, and her latest publication, A Falling-Off Place — The Transformation of Lower Manhattan.
In “South Street,” photographed in the 1980s, Mensch documented the forces at work to transform the waterfront at the Fulton Market from a nocturnal workingman’s culture to a commercial mall and shopping destination.
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