Mr. Felver’s “body of work to date remains unique and unparalleled. He has produced definitive works on cultural icons of many genres. I cannot recall any other artist who has so consistently produced on a similar level.
The overall integrity of his books and films reveals his visual signature as well as never imposing his vision upon the subject. This is a very difficult quality to attain and is the mark of a mature artist. It is for these reasons that Chris Felver’s work makes such a clear cultural contribution. These anthologies will remain the definitive testament to their subject.”
Christopher Felver is a cultural documentarian. His distinctive visual signature is a lasting contribution to the legacy of our national cultural community. Felver’s films & photographs reads like a roster of American mid-century avant-garde.
Felver’s books are: Tending the Fire: Native Voices & Portraits (University of New Mexico Press, 2017); American Jukebox (Indiana University Press, 2014); Beat (Last Gasp, 2007) an intimate memoir of image, text, and reminiscence; The Late Great Allen Ginsberg (Thunder’s Mouth Press, 2002); The Importance of Being (Arena Editions, 2001), with 400 portraits of eminent figures in American arts, letters, music, and politics; Ferlinghetti Portrait (Gibbs Smith Publisher, 1998); Angels, Anarchists & Gods (Louisiana State University Press, 1996), featuring the American avant-garde; The Poet Exposed (Alfred Van der Marck Editions, 1986), a monograph of contemporary American poets; and Seven Days in Nicaragua Libre (City Lights Books, 1984), co-authored with Lawrence Ferlinghetti.
Mr. Felver’s documentaries have captured the spirit and creativity of many international artists and include The Spirit of Golf (2020); Anthony Cragg: Inside/Outside (2020); Ferlinghetti: A Rebirth of Wonder (2013); Cecil Taylor: All the Notes (2005); Donald Judd’s Marfa Texas (1998); The Coney Island of Lawrence Ferlinghetti (1996); Tony Cragg: In Celebration of Sculpture (1993); John Cage Talks About Cows (1991); Taken by the Romans (1990); West Coast: Beat & Beyond (1984); and California Clay in the Rockies (1983).
The National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC, the New York Public Library, and the Museum of Fine Art in Boston have presented retrospectives of his films. Mr. Felver’s work has been exhibited in many forums worldwide including: Guild Hall, East Hampton (2016); New York Public Library (2007); Fahey Klein Gallery in Los Angeles (2002); The National Gallery of Art in Washington DC (2006); the Maine Photographic Workshop (2002); Robert Berman Gallery, Los Angeles (2007,2014); the New York Public Library (2007); Blues for Smoke, MOCA Los Angeles (2012) & New York Whitney Museum (2013, 2016); Art Institute for the Permian Basin, Odessa, Texas(1987); Arco d’ Alibert, Rome (1987); Torino Fotografia Biennale Internazionale, Italy (1989); Centre Georges Pompidou, Paris (1994); La Biennale di Venezia (1996); Roosevelt Study Center, Middelburg, Netherlands (1998); London National Theatre( 2011).
Aside from portraits, Mr. Felver has also produced another body of work entitled: Ordered World. About this body of work, curator, James Crump writes, “Mr. Felver celebrates the elemental essences manmade and natural objects that tend to elude observation. Working in a manner not unlike Karl Blossfeldt, Albert Renger-Patzsch and the New Objectivity artists of 1920s and ’30s Germany, Felver asserts his own contemporary vision here. His pictures are informed by Minimalism and the keen, refined observation of a poet unwilling to discard the mundane or topical content that surrounds us but, nevertheless, is overlooked in the quickened pace of our technologically frenzied age. The series, while concerned with monumentalizing and focusing our attention on the ordered and structured surfaces of objects, resists any historical referencing to the hardened gaze of the twentieth century. It asks the viewer to ruminate on the overlooked beauty which surrounds us, the wonderment that unfolds, with careful and refined examination.”
In 1994 Felver attended a Connecticut gathering of Native American dancers in ceremonial dress. These 20 photographs capture a traditional gathering of Northeastern tribes in Felver’s direct portrait style.
As visiting artist in 1988 & 1989 at the American Academy in Rome, Felver made over 250 portraits of European artists across the continent. Mr. Felver’s 1350 portraits represent American and European cultural icons.
In 1984 Mr. Felver traveled as a journalist to Japan, Hong Kong and Beijing documenting the customs and social conditions.
Writers Lawrence Ferlingetti, Robert Creeley, David Amram, Amiri Baraka, George Plimpton, David Shapiro, Luc Sante, Lee Ranaldo, William Parker, Douglas Brinkley, Gary Snyder, Lance Henson, Linda Hogan and Simon Ortiz have written introductions for Mr Felver’s books.
