THE PRINCE AND THE PAUPER

A Photographic Introspection by Horia Manolache

In a series of richly-imagined portraits, visual artist Horia Manolache has explored the way in which stereotypes and prejudices regarding homeless people are formed in and inhabit the social perceptions. A part of our photographic series, the exhibition based on this journey into a world of exclusion presents ten moving digital portraits of homeless individuals living in the streets of San Francisco who are not reluctant to share their vision of how they dream to be regarded. Throughout his work, Horia Manolache has responded to actual social crisis in thoughtful and powerful ways by creating works examining the background and social environments that has given rise to them. His approach reveals the cultural forces at play and at the same time offers a place of reflection, dreaming, and hoping. Horia's striking portraits are a judicious and of-the-moment exploration of social status and possibility. Inspired by Caravaggio's dramatic technique of vividly painting crucial moments in a scene, he’s employing chiaroscuro techniques and a tenebrous pallet in order to make the emotion and spirit of his subjects hauntingly manifest.

Horia Manolache holds a BA degree in film making followed by a MFA at the University of San Francisco's Academy of Art. His series “The Chairs” won the first place in Bookproposal category at Prix de la Photographie in Paris in 2014, was exhibited in a solo show at Corden Potts Gallery in 2016, and came in the 4th place at the Florence Biennale a year later. The project "The Prince and The Pauper” was presented at DeYoung Museum as part of San Francisco’s photographic history along with the work of Carleton Watkins, Eadweard Muybridge, Arnold Genthe, Ansel Adams, John Gutmann, and Dorothea Lange.