Juan Carlos Alom

Born in: 1964
From: Havana, Cuba
Lives and works: Havana, Cuba
Represented by: El Apartamento
Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Carlos_Alom

UN goals

Biography

Juan Carlos Alom is a photographer and filmmaker that has been tirelessly portraying Cubans and the Caribbean diaspora around the world. For the past decades, he has experimented with different formats but remains faithful to analog photography and filmmaking, showing a special liking for black and white. During the 1990’s, he witnessed what is known as the Special Period, an economic depression in Cuba following the Soviet Union’s dissolution. Portraying friends in intimate settings, the series Special Period aimed at showing another angle of the crisis and concentrated on how youths lived it.

Alom’s work on the secret society Abakúa and on medicinal plants show a strong connexion to street photography, particularly to Manuel Álvarez Bravo who portrayed Mexico, its communities and landscape in the 1940’s.

If we go back as early as the 1900's, Eugène Atget portraying the topography of “Old Paris” echoes Alom’s connexion with the streets. His surrealist approach marked generations to come and most likely had an impact in Alom’s practice.

Career highlights

Solo shows

2017, Universidad de Connecticut, Connecticut, USA: Cuban Analog
2017, Los Angeles Film Forum, Los Angeles, USA: Ism, Ism, Ism: Havana Solo; the films of Juan Carlos Alom
2015, Fototeca de Pachuca, Pachuca, Mexico: Nacidos para ser libres
2012, Buzz Art Gallery, Wynwood Arts District, Miami, USA: 1989 - 2012 Fotografías de Juan Carlos Alom
2009, Galería Villa Manuela, Havana, Cuba: Esperamos en el monte