Goings On About Town: Art
Reed Bontecou
Bontecou, the head surgeon at a
Washington, D.C., Army hospital during the Civil War, photographed
wounded soldiers to document their injuries and treatment. His
sepia-toned albumen prints were mounted in the elegant oval formats
typical of the period’s popular carte-de-visite portraits, and his
subjects do their best to strike a formal pose while half dressed and
badly hurt. In the nearly fifty small examples here, grave young men
display amputated limbs, bullet wounds, missing fingers, and disfigured
faces. But Bontecou’s sympathy turns what could be mere medical
curiosities into true portraits—complicated, touching, and unsettling.
Through Nov. 12.
Through November 12
24 W. 57th St., New York, NY
646-455-0393
