Scrapbook of a Spiritual Journey

Minor White, one of the 20th Century’s foremost photographers, claims a place beside such luminaries as Alfred Stieglitz, Edward Weston, Paul Strand and Ansel Adams. Still, he stands apart from these giants, says scholar Peter C. Brunnell.

“In later life, White developed a direction toward the spiritual and sacred in art, so that the nature of his photographs becomes one of revelation rather than objective depiction. That’s a very different view,” said Brunnell, who has organized the first major retrospective of White’s work. The traveling exhibit, staged 13 years after the photographer’s death, runs at New York’s Museum of Modern Art Thursday through June 18.

A breathtaking photograph of Wyoming’s Grand Teton National Park, the final image in the 185-piece exhibit, perfectly symbolizes this revelatory vision, Brunnell said, one derived from White’s autobiographic style.

“In comparison to Adams, who also photographed the Tetons, White has a much grander sense of light and a transcendent sense that goes beyond the grandeur of nature to a godlike, spiritual idea.”

“Minor White: The Eye That Shapes” includes portraiture, nude studies and architecture as well as landscape from 1938 to 1976. Drawn from the Minor White Archive at Princeton University, the show also features 10 rare color photographs.

Brunnell, McAlpin professor of the history of photography and modern art at Princeton, organized the exhibit for the university’s museum where he is photography curator.

“White has a very complicated reputation because he devoted an enormous amount of energy to teaching (photography) and such things as personal growth through photography. He was also editor of Aperture (the progressive photographic journal) for 23 years. My argument is that as he is reappraised today, he must first be seen as an image maker, not in terms of his other work and interests. My goal with this retrospective was to lay out his total accomplishments in photography. This gives us the first chance to see his entire career.”

“Minor White: The Eye That Shapes” will travel to six institutions including the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. It will open there in June, 1990.

TRANSITION: “Lifelong friends, a wealth of skills, a place to develop myself as an artist,” says Terry Wolverton, outgoing executive director of the Woman’s Building, are what nearly 13 years with the woman’s cultural center have given her. Departing to devote more time to writing a book, Wolverton has organized her own “farewell performance party” for Saturday at 8 p.m. at the center. “The Woman’s Building Changed My Life,” a performance art piece, will highlight the event, a fund-raiser for the institution where Wolverton has held various posts over the years. Tickets are $15 at the door. Information: (213) 221-6161. Wolverton said her successor will probably be named this week.

IN MEMORY: A public memorial service for Los Angeles-born sculptor Isamu Noguchi is scheduled for today at 2 p.m. at the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center. The service will include tributes by those who knew and worked with the artist who died last December. The center has established a cash prize in Noguchi’s name to be periodically awarded to emerging Japanese American artists.

GRANTS: Ten Southern California visual art institutions have been awarded a total of $156,000 by the National Endowment for the Arts. The organizations, among more than 120 nationwide winning a total of $1.85 million from the federal agency, are: Los Angeles Contemporary Exhibitions, $42,500; Centro Cultural de la Raza, San Diego, $20,000; Sushi, San Diego, $17,500; Self-Help Graphics and Art, Los Angeles, $17,500; Santa Barbara Contemporary Arts Forum, $15,000; Social and Public Arts Resource Center, Los Angeles, $12,500; Los Angeles Center for Photographic Studies, $12,500; Installation, San Diego, $12,500; The Woman’s Building, Los Angeles, $10,000; Foundation for Art Resources, Los Angeles, $5,000.