Victor Macarol - a vision to be savoredby Dr. Abraham A. Davidson Perhaps what delights me most about Victor Macarol's work is the fascinating pairings of subjects that he discovers in the most ordinary of circumstances; they seem to exist (and in a moment will cease existing in that same state) entirely by accident. These pairings often skirt between jest and drama. They are multilayered in that the viewer can conjure up several reasons as to why these particular ones should have been juxtaposed, without ever being certain of the correct reason, or whether there is, in fact, a single explanation. For instance, consider the cat on New York's Thompson Street seated upon a stepladder next to a window out of which a large poster-photo of Marilyn Monroe faces us. First we notice that the postures of the cat and the woman, both with legs extended from the torso, are similar. The seated feline possesses the potential for lithe movement, as does the image of Marilyn. They both seem unaware of their own seductiveness, whether furry or fleshy, and, if the cat is smaller than the woman, the legs of the ladder, as extenders, make the cat appear closer in size to the pictured woman. It is marvelous that so many of the photographs remain as open-ended as they do in a number of possible ways they can be interpreted. On a Paris street Macarol photographed a dog playfully rolling on its back next to an old woman using an umbrella as a cane. Is it the dog beside her that highlights the contrast between their inability to move freely? Or, perhaps, its legs as four extenders echo the woman with two legs who holds her umbrella as an extra extender? For some reason, Macarol is fascinated by dogs, not only by the lithe greyhound variety or by the fierce wolf-hound variety, but also by the short, homely, rather ordinary variety. One such dog, caught in a car on Bleecker Street in New York, has comically taken the place of the driver, its absent master. Another such dog, in a parked car on East 7th Street, again in New York, is presented with its face distorted by the window glass standing between it and the viewer. This dog becomes devilish, sinister and threatening, even while retaining, remarkably, the barest hint of the need for cuddling - again the open-ended possibility for interpretation. Macarol's perceptiveness of what he is trying to accomplish has to do with the discovery of relationships that exist momentarily within the life of the urban environment. In his work the purity and the harshness of reality coexist: indeed, much of it has to do with Macarol's unique sense of humor that amuses the viewer at first until the real meaning it represents or masks is realized. Victor Macarol's is a vision to be savored. * The essay by Prof. Dr. Abraham A. Davidson, Department of Art History, Tyler School of Art, Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, appears as a preface in the exhibition brochures for Victor Macarol's one-man exhibitions at Kreves Gallery in Frenchtown, and The Paterson Museum, New Jersey ___________________________________________________________________________ "...Victor Macarol received the largest state 'Fellowship Award' for photography since the program was begun. He has been recognized by The New Jersey State Council on the Arts as 'Distinguished Artist,' the first time that designation has been made."
Patricia Malarcher ___________________________________________________________________________ "...This well-known New Jersey photographer [Victor Macarol] is at his best with "found" humans and animals. And there is no lack of memorable images here. One is that of a disembodied hand on a desk, the only sign of life in an office...No mean landscapist either, Mr. Macarol can invest with Ansel Adams-like grandeur a pile of pumpkins in a harrowed field under a stormy sky. The best of his romantic shots is of mountain peaks glistening like marble under another stormy sky."
Vivien Raynor ___________________________________________________________________________ "...[The] judge, in an unusual gesture, invited contribution from 19 professionals, among them Victor Macarol, and other members of the [New Jersey] state's photographic establishment. The [Hunterdon Museum of Art] show's title, "Seasons of Life," is elastic enough to accommodate everything from spring blossoms to the weathered boots, but the emphasis is on youth...Mr. Macarol's young girl with long hair has a nun-like propriety about her, but appears capable of holding her own with the minxes portrayed by another hot New York photographer."
Vivien Raynor ___________________________________________________________________________ "...Like its predecessors, the exhibition ["102 Prints"] is displayed on the second and third floors in cases surrounding the light well, and on the walls. But the casualness is deceptive: visitors will leave much better informed than they were upon arrival and with precious little effort, too. And as usual, there is plenty to satisfy connoisseurs, including Ambroise Vollard's 1914 volume on Cezanne that has an etching by the artist for a frontispiece...Original works include anonymous Chinese watercolors of flowers and insects that date from the 19th century..."The Steerage," by Alfred Stieglitz, is of the company; so is Victor Macarol's study of the Flatiron Building, towering black against a white sky and looking more like an aircraft carrier seen from below than an iron."
Vivien Raynor ___________________________________________________________________________ "...Inside [The Morris Museum] is an exhibition of photographs titled "Photography: A Personal View." Some of the work it includes is quite wonderful...Victor Macarol's "Young Man With Rat" is just that, a young black man with a two-toned rat around his neck. The seriousness of his gaze makes it clear that this is no joke, but one does wonder why he would keep such an odd pet, and again we are left surprised, even puzzled."
John Caldwell "...Photographs of landscapes and buildings have their own beauties, but they rarely have the compassionate warmth that photographs of people have. It is sometimes more gratifying, and certainly easier for an observer, to respond to the conditions of other human beings, no matter how different or similar, than to the physical configurations of a tree or a wall...People play an important role in the photography of Victor Macarol. In fact, it's the people who endow these photographs not only with warmth, but also with a pressing vitality that is transferred to their surroundings, thus making the inanimate seem all the more animate and lively."
David L. Shirey "...Instead of thinking about stretching feelings to extremes, [Victor Macarol] thinks about resolving opposites. He understands the links and the balance between things. Thus he pays more attention to echoes, overtones, gradations, reverberations and glimmers than he does to objects themselves. His pictures are a balancing act, with Macarol liking to give contradictions in daily life a chance to develop. The result is often a contrast between two moments in time, which can be nostalgic, even poignant."
Victoria Donohoe ___________________________________________________________________________ "...Viewers [at The Paterson Museum, New Jersey] can get a look at the black and white photography that has given Victor Macarol - recipient of the Distinguished Artist Award from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts - worldwide recognition. Today Macarol's work is seen by more people than ever. His lithographs are published and distributed worldwide by a publishing company in Switzerland and the Musée de l'Elysée in Lausanne, Switzerland."
Nicholas Toma ___________________________________________________________________________
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