What matters most to you?
See what our visitors wrote on our cards in the AGO exhibition What Matters Most: Photographs of Black Life.
Various photographers, instant prints, 1950s-2000s. Fade Resistance collection. Purchase, with funds donated by Martha LA McCain, 2018. From the exhibition What Matters Most: Photographs of Black Life, August 27, 2002 – January 8, 2023. Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto.
To Zun Lee, Toronto artist, educator and What Matters Most: Photographs of Black Life co-curator, an instant photograph does not simply freeze a moment in time. It is intimate, meaningful and extends past its fact as an object. On the wall of this exhibition is a quote by him that reads, “We understood that a photograph we cherish always moves with, in and through us; it never actually freezes time and space.” The Polaroid print itself triggers and activates memories, from celebrating birthday milestones to spending a mundane day-to-day afternoon. Family photographs are the moments that matter most during the course of a person’s life.
Co-curated by Lee and Sophie Hackett, AGO Curator, Photography, the exhibition features the AGO’s Fade Resistance collection – a group of Polaroid instant prints of African-American family life from the 1950s to the early 2000s collected by Lee. The presentation shows more than 500 prints and prompts us to think about what these photographs mean and reveal.
As you make your way through the space, you will see a table piled with cards that are reproductions of select Polaroid prints from the exhibition. There are three different versions of the back of the cards. Some are blank; some have a prompt that reads “What matters most to you?” and some feature short poems by poet, essayist and artist Dawn Lundy Martin.
Installation view, What Matters Most Photographs of Black Life, August 27, 2022 - January 8, 2023. Art Gallery of Ontario. Photo © AGO.
The cards are an invitation to write thoughts, comments and feedback on what you are feeling in the moment in the exhibition; you can take one home, pass it to a friend or leave it in our gallery for others to ponder. So far, we have seen an array of responses including short poems, opinions, advice, stories and interpretations of photographs in English and other languages.
Here are some examples.
Various photographers, instant prints, 1950s-2000s. Fade Resistance collection. Purchase, with funds donated by Martha LA McCain, 2018. From the exhibition What Matters Most: Photographs of Black Life, August 27, 2002 – January 8, 2023. Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto.
In addition to the cards, you can also share a story, a poem or your thoughts by leaving a voicemail. Call 1-800 Fade Resistance (1-888-664-1981), a dedicated phone number, and you can leave an audio message. 1-800 Fade Resistance is an archival audio project connected to the AGO’s Fade Resistance collection. The AGO will save the voicemails as records of your response. This project is inspired by the volunteer-run 1-800 Happy Birthday project. To learn more, visit 1800happybirthday.com. If you do not wish for your name to be made public at any future date, please leave your voicemail anonymously.
The aim for creating these two engagements was to bring the experience of making Polaroids into the exhibition. Firstly, the physical cards provide you with the tactile sense of a Polaroid print. Secondly, the voicemail line builds on the social exchange that is integral to photographing people. When taking photos, the sitter in the photo is almost always in conversation with the photographer – whether it is to ask how the photo looks or if a retake is necessary. The line was also meant to possibly become a channel for you to talk to the people in the Polaroids, talk to the collection or to other visitors.
On view now through January 8, 2023, What Matters Most: Photographs of Black Life is located at the AGO on Level 1 in galleries 128 and 129 — it is included in General Admission. For more information on the exhibition, please visit https://ago.ca/exhibitions/what-matters-most-photographs-black-life.
