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PROOF Benefit Auction

Photo: "Jerry Seinfeld and Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Los Angeles, 1993" by Mark Seliger, will be up for auction!

Photo: "Jerry Seinfeld and Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Los Angeles, 1993" by Mark Seliger, will be up for auction!

Let the Love Affair Begin!

With the auction less than a month away, it's time to start "bonding" with some of the pieces. Each day, we will be uploading a new photograph for you to check out, along with a short bio on the photographer. This will give you a chance to test the waters and see what is out there until you inevitably find the one, or ones, you love! Think of it as online dating... 

Who will you be taking home? 


Pontoise, Franck Bohbot

Franck Bohbot was born in Paris, France in 1980. He has an MBA in Media and Film Production and also attended Business School at ESG in Paris. In 2007, he discovered his passion for photography after moving to New York. He is particularly interested in depicting architecture and urban landscapes. His photographs cover a wide array of subjects, ranging from parked cars and swimming pools to nightscapes and portraits. Franck cites Stanley Kubrick, Julius Shulman, and Edward Hopper as his artistic influences, and over the last four years, has received numerous awards for his work, including The International Photo Award and the Photography Master Cup. His work has been exhibited in cities around the world, among them, Paris, Strasbourg, Kiev, and Los Angeles.


Samdo/Kunga, 2010, Phil Borges

For over twenty-five years Phil Borges has been documenting indigenous and tribal cultures, striving to create an understanding of the challenges they face. His work is exhibited in museums and galleries worldwide and his award winning books, which have been published in four languages, include Tibetan Portrait, Enduring Spirit, Women Empowered, and Tibet: Culture on the Edge. He has hosted television documentaries on indigenous cultures for Discovery and National Geographic channels. Phil also lectures and teaches internationally. In 2000, Phil founded an online classroom program called Bridges to Understanding. He also co-founded Blue Earth Alliance, a 501c3 that sponsors photographic projects focusing on endangered cultures and threatened environments.


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William Burroughs and Jack Kerouac, 1953, Allen Ginsberg

Allen Ginsberg, primarily a poet, was one of the leading figures of the Beat Generation in the 1950’s and the 1960’s counterculture. He is best known for his poem “Howl” which became the subject of great controversy in 1957. Ginsberg began taking photographs in 1953 when he purchased a small, secondhand Kodak camera. For the next decade he captured numerous intimate shots of himself as well as his friends and lovers. He abandoned photography in 1963 but returned to it in the early 1980s. Encouraged by photographers Berenice Abbott and Robert Frank, he reprinted much of his early work and began making new portraits, adding sometimes extensive inscriptions. Although Ginsberg's photographs form a compelling portrait of the Beat and counterculture generation from the 1950s to the 1990s, his pictures are far more than mere historical documents. The same ideas that inform his poetry—an intense observation of the world, a deep appreciation of the beauty of the vernacular, a celebration of the sacredness of the present, and a faith in intuitive expression—also permeate his photography.


Mother and Child at Car Window, Steve McCurry

Steve McCurry has been one of the most iconic voices in contemporary photography for more than thirty years, with scores of magazine and book covers, over a dozen books, and countless exhibitions around the world to his name. After studying film at Pennsylvania State University, McCurry went on to work for a local newspaper. After traveling first to India, and then Pakistan, McCurry met Afghan refugees who smuggled him into Afghanistan. He spent several weeks embedded with the Mujahideen, McCurry brought the world the first images of the conflict in Afghanistan, putting a human face to the issue on every masthead. His work spans conflicts, vanishing cultures, ancient traditions and contemporary culture alike - yet always retains the human element that made his celebrated image of the Afghan Girl such a powerful image. He is a recipient of the Robert Capa Gold Medal, National Press Photographers Award, and an unprecedented four first prize awards from the World Press Photo contest.


Andy Warhol with Self Portrait SB, Factory Fire Escape III, William John Kennedy 

William John Kennedy studied at Syracuse University, the School of Visual Arts, and Pratt Institute. After working in the 1950s as an assistant and studio manager for renowned Vogue fashion photographer Clifford Coffin, Kennedy enjoyed a rewarding career as a top freelance photographer in New York City. This rare photograph is from a recently rediscovered body of work  taken in 1963-64 just as Andy Warhol was on the cusp of fame.  The documentary on his work  “Before They Were Famous: behind the Lens of William John Kennedy” ran on WNET in September, concurrent with a solo exhibition at Steven Kasher Gallery.  His work has been widely exhibited internationally, and he recently opened a solo exhibition at The Indianapolis Museum of Art.  Kennedy’s work is in major public and private collections including the Whitney, the Andy Warhol Museum, The Indianapolis Museum of Art, and the Detroit Institute of Arts.