"Gesture, Posture, and Bad Attitude in Contemporary News Photography: Apex Art"
By Lily Faust, The New York Art World, Summer 2001

In his film, True Stories, David Byrne creates a storyline by piecing together disparate stories found in various newspaper articles. Similarly, in Gesture, Posture and Bad Attitude in Contemporary News Photography Byrne curates an exhibition of news photos taken by photojournalists, and displays the photographs in a manner which can be read as a choreographed performance. The performance is one of acculturated gestures, typical of world leaders or political persona; Pope John Paul and President Clinton touching heads in a secretive exchange, followed by President Bush shaking hands with the South Korean President, (and smiling at viewers by way of the camera) with shots of other presidents, mayors, and assorted public figures engaged in exemplary behavior. Leaders smile, /click/ a mayor and a millionaire express opinions with open hands, /click/ two Chinese leaders share a joke hidden by hands concealing mouths, /click/click/ whole people, demonstrators, protesters and victims, sandwiched between the leaders on both ends of the exhibition, are dragged, grabbed, confronted and ultimately changed by the executive decisions from the top. A loaded spectacle, for sure.

These are news photographs by fourteen photojournalists, among whom are Harry Hamburg and David Handschuh, of New York Daily News and Srkjan Ilic, of AP/Wide World Photos. As David Byrne states in the exhibition brochure, concerning news photos, "Self-expression and artistic license are kept to a minimum." The ideological biases of editors do not come into the picture as readily as they would in the written medium. The photographs, although crisp in contrast and detail, are not taken with aesthetic considerations. Byrne uses the documentation of these photographs to create a simultaneous gathering of disparate events, reflecting his point that a grammar of stereotypical body language is revealed through repetitious appearance.

De-contextualizing the photographs from the articles, Byrne is able to focus on the viewer's attention on the political figures in the photographs. In this collage of contemporary scenes culled from the news media, (from 1992 to the present) one becomes aware of the repetition of certain hand gestures, smiles and body language that become tools in convincing and possibly obfuscating the public. As Byrne calls this display, "a dance of politics," the viewer becomes aware of the visual language that is employed in enacting a possible drama; whose acts are staged, once again, in the gallery.

Oddly enough, when we give up puzzling over the deeper significance that Byrne attributes this group of images, and surrender to the formal content of the photographs, there is still a great deal to be perceived. The adult bravado of a cigar smoking East Asian boy, or the apparent fear of two Palestinians under Israeli fire, moments before they are hit, give a visceral credence to photographs that lack credibility in the photographs of politicians. It is the contrast, as depicted in the news photos, of the choreographed versus the natural, the polished versus the raw this exhibition truly worthwhile.