Dead Ringers: Portraits of abandoned payphones is being presented as a solo exhibition in the Focus Gallery. The work explores and documents the remains of public payphones, a once vital technology as it fades into history, having been for the most part made obsolete by the rise of the cellphone. Amy uses an iPhone, to capture her pictures recording the remnants of the technology it replaced.
This solo exhibition is being presented in conjunction with Eric Kunsman’s Felicific Calculus to shine a light on the impact of changing technology in public spaces. While collectively the exhibitions explore the same subject matter, public payphones, they have different starting points, employ different approaches and arrive at different results.
Amy Becker: Dead Ringers: Portraits of abandoned payphones
Opening Reception: March 16th, 5:00 – 8:00 p.m., part of Gallery Night Providence
Exhibition on View: March 16th – April 11th 2023
Artist Statement
Dead Ringers: Portraits of abandoned payphones
My interests typically explore visual stories that arise from the random interaction and juxtapositions of people, everyday found objects, and moments within those environments.
For this ongoing project, Dead Ringers: Portraits of abandoned payphones, I set aside my 35mm camera. Instead, I use my iPhone camera—the very invention that has rendered payphones into relics.
While the necessity for payphones has largely vanished, they remain standing—often abandoned, beaten, and disfigured. For me, the world has turned into a perpetual scavenger hunt to discover these payphones. I often find them hidden in plain sight. Many, stripped down to a shell of their former selves, reveal a suggestion of sculpture in metal and plastic. Admittedly, when I do find a rare working phone, I’m disappointed.
Still, for a lot of us, payphones are linked to collective memories. Think of Clark Kent rushing to the nearest phone booth, emerging as mythic Superman, ready to save Lois Lane. Or students cramming themselves into phone booths.
Payphones represent one path to human connection. Dead Ringers depicts the vestiges of those machines and the environments in which they exist.
– Amy Becker
About: Amy Becker
Amy Becker is an award-winning New Jersey-based photographer whose work typically depicts visual stories that emerge from the random interaction of everyday moments and found objects within their natural environments.
In 2021 Amy was awarded a Fellowship for photography from the New Jersey State Council on
the Arts. Additionally, she had a solo show at Monmouth Museum in Lincroft, NJ, as part of
the 2020-2021 New Jersey Emerging Artists Series. Beyond the Garden State, she has exhibited in museums and in nationally recognized fine art photography venues, such as the Center for Fine Art Photography in Colorado, Soho Photo in New York City, Houston Center of Photography, and Chicago’s Filter Photo Festival. Additionally, her work has been included in exhibitions in Philadelphia, Minneapolis, Providence, Vermont, and Oregon, as well as regional educational institutions. Media recognition of her work has appeared in The Guardian and many photography publications, including Lenscratch, Photo Review, and Fraction Magazine.
Amy is trained in both traditional and digital photography. Her formal background includes coursework at the International Center of Photography, as well as numerous workshops. A graduate of Boston University’s School of Communications, she enjoyed a career as a copywriter before becoming a photographer.
Amy Becker: Dead Ringers: Portraits of abandoned payphones
Opening Reception: March 16th, 5:00 – 8:00 p.m., part of Gallery Night Providence
Exhibition on View: March 16th – April 14th 2023
Leave a Reply