Ludak Exhibits ‘In Plain Sight’ at Soho Photo Gallery

Mark Ludak, MFA, assistant professor in the Department of Art and Design, has photographs from his project In Plain Sight on view at Soho Photo Gallery. The show runs July 15 through Aug. 9 at 539 W. 23rd St. in Chelsea, adjacent the High Line, in New York.

In Plain Sight captures the "lasting effects of prejudice, fear, and the forced relocation of U.S. citizens during World War II internment and detention." Focusing on sites where Japanese American citizens and German nationals were confined, the photographs consider places and histories that have receded from public awareness.

The exhibition depicts "places where families were uprooted, communities surveilled and detained, then largely forgotten by the country that held them." Ludak explains that between 110,000 and 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry were subject to forced removal during this time, the majority of them American citizens, while approximately 11,500 people of German ancestry and 3,000 of Italian ancestry were interned as well.

Through these photographs, In Plain Sight displays "a particular form of erasure - not destruction, but a quieter, more deliberate forgetting."

Founded in 1971 by a group of New York Times photographers, Soho Photo Gallery is New York City's longest operating member-run photography gallery. The gallery exhibits a wide range of fine-art photography including individual member shows, gallery-wide themed exhibits, national competitions and prestigious guest exhibitions.