After more than three years of conducting research and waiting for the perfect lighting, two photographer’s shots of Arizona’s signature architecture are featured in City Hall’s new art exhibit, “Phoenix Icons: The Art of Our Historic Landmarks.”
The exhibit, which opened Friday, shows the work of photographers Patrick Madigan and Michael Lundgren and captures Phoenix history through well-known architecture structures dating from around 1912 to post-World War II.
Madigan said he now has a relationship with the buildings and respects Phoenix more after doing the research. He even takes certain routes home to pass by some of the landmarks.
Ed Lebow, director of the Phoenix office of arts and culture public art program, said the pictures were taken from two projects focusing on first century and midcentury architecture.
The photos in “Phoenix Icons” were taken between 2006 and 2010. They are fairly traditional pictures that emphasize the architecture of the building. Each photo in the gallery has a small placard that says the name of the building, the date it was built, the photographer and a brief description of the landmark’s history.
Madigan said people ask him about the history of buildings of which they have memories.
“It’s like seeing someone taking pictures of one of your friends,” Madigan said. “You want to know the connection between them.”
The gallery used to be a meeting room, but with the Arizona Centennial anniversary the city of Phoenix wanted to showcase its history, Lebow said. The room was reconstructed, and the official opening of The Gallery @ City Hall happened in March with the “Place: Images of the West” exhibition. It featured works the city of Phoenix collected and stored in the Phoenix Municipal Art Collection throughout the past 100 years.
“We want people to recognize and cherish what we have,” volunteer coordinator Donna Reiner said. “To immerse yourself in what these buildings are is, I think, really important. They speak a lot for the history of Phoenix.”
Kevin Vaughan-Brubaker, project manager at Derix Art Glass Consultants and former city of Phoenix public art project manager, said he enjoyed seeing places he has been before like Mystery Castle, built in 1930 by Boyce Luther Gulley for his daughter.
“Just the way architecture creates a sense of place is interesting,” Vaughan-Brubaker said. “Unique, historic architecture — that’s where a city’s character comes from.”
The gallery, funded by private donations, supplements a seven-part lecture series that will start on Oct. 16 with Grady Gammage Jr. speaking on historic preservation and Phoenix. The free seminars start at 7 p.m. at Burton Barr Central Library in the Pulliam Auditorium.
“Phoenix Icons: The Art of Our Historic Landmarks” is free to the public from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at Gallery @ City Hall, located on the first floor of City Hall on Washington Street between First and Third avenues.
Contact the reporter at alicia.m.canales@asu.edu
