Mark S. Kornbluth

Photography

Mark Kornbluth_Richard Rodgers.jpg

ARTIST’S STATEMENT

My life is deeply tied to New York City, Times Square and Broadway. It started here, and I always return to this place; I did theatre professionally, and many of my close friends still do.

I approached this series with the intention to dramatize the language and narrative in the signage, contrasted with the stillness of the mise-en-scene. Despite the sudden and lasting emptiness that the pandemic gave rise to, I discovered a delightful tension, a sense of Broadway waiting for the promise and renewal that art invariably brings.

Returning night after night to the abandoned Theater District, I walked the streets, making my way past shuttered restaurants. I was enveloped by the hush that fell over the city, broken by the occasional siren. I was able to capture the individual images that became "Silent Broadway: a series of theatres, dark, during the pandemic."

I chose to work in medium format, which allowed me to document the unpopulated landscape in stark contrast to the nuanced details of the theaters.

Studying acting at the graduate level gave me a greater sense of proportion, relationships, and theatricality. I’m deeply curious about relationships between objects, how emotions are rooted in time and place, and how to create the power of a shared experience.

This project is a culmination of everything I’ve done with my life, a return home.

I invite my audience to view these images as I have come to see them, as windows through which memory and time work in both directions --we need only look a little closer to know we will someday return, together.