Our June/July exhibit features MAPSO Prom, Goldberg’s portraits from a Maplewood tradition; Prom Night at the Springfield Avenue Gazebo, where mostly students of color show up in style for the Columbia High School Prom. Friends, family, and members of the community gather each year to watch. Inspired by photographer Mary Ellen Mark masterwork PROM, MAPSO PROM is a celebration of the beauty and talents of the under-represented, a reflection on diversity and integration in Maplewood and South Orange.
Franck Goldberg has also contributed to the Basquiat’s “Defacement”: The Untold Story, currently on exhibit at the Guggenheim. (Defacement is also known as “The Death of Michael Stewart”.) The exhibition gallery opens and closes with a reproduction of a video still from Franck’s documentary Who Killed Michael Stewart? which will be screened at the museum on July 16.
In the gallery section, ephemera that Franck loaned is presented in a glass case, including a flyer he designed for a benefit screening of Who Killed Michael Stewart? at Tin Pan Alley Bar in 1984.
The exhibition book includes video stills from Franck’s documentary, and, among other interviews, his recollection of the Michael Stewart Case.