SCOTT MACLEAY: THE AMERICAN CENTER YEARS AND THE PARIS BIENNIAL MONTH OF PHOTOGRAPHY

In September 1980, Scott MacLeay founded the Photography Department at the prestigious American Center for Artists in Paris, considered by most to be one of the most avant-garde cultural institutions in the capital. His activities are detailed in the extracts below from the book "Le Raspail Vert: l'American Center à Paris 1934-1994 - une histoire des avant-garde franco-americaines" de Nelcya Delanoë. Two weeks prior to beginning his work at the Center, he had the first solo exhibition of his work at the SPACE GALLERY in New York. At the invitation of Center for Media Art founder Don Foresta in January 1981 he participated in the first slow-scan transmission of images from the Center for Advanced Visual Studies at M.I.T. to the American Center for Artists in Paris and from the American Center to M.I.T.

Vin Grabill's video of this historic event can be seen at this link: h ttp://www.scottmacleay.com/slow-scan

From the very outset, MacLeay’s artistic career and his work at the American Center seemed to be inexorably linked. Two months after founding the Photography Department he was invited to participate in the group exhibition AVANT-GARDE for the first Biennial Month of Photography of the City of Paris at the GALERIE UFFICIO DELL’ARTE / CRÉATIS, the gallery that would represent his work in Europe until the mid-80s.

In 1982, MacLeay was named Rockefeller Foundation/ American Center Artist in Residence for the creation of his exhibition FRAGMENTS, CYCLES, SONS for the 1982 Paris Biennial Month of Photography. The exhibition involved the juxtaposition of a looped musical soundtrack and a looped cycle of lighting of each exhibition wall that were of different durations, thereby provoking completely unpredictable combinations of sound and visible work in the exhibition space. A portion of the colour work would travel to New York for exhibition at the MARCUSE PFEIFER GALLERY in April 1983. The gallery would represent his work until the retirement of gallery owner/director Cusie Pfeifer in the mid-90s.

During the Paris exhibition a Dutch documentary film crew (Director: Ferdinand Ronteltap / Director of Photography: Leon Huijbers) made a film about the multi-media event, an extract of which can be seen at the following link: h ttp://www.scottmacleay.com/fragments

In 1985, MacLeay was named Director of the Center for Media Art and Photography at the American Center for Artists founded by Don Foresta in 1978. He was responsible for the development and operational planning of the Center’s quarterly educational program in video, photography and electronic music. In addition to these pedagogical functions, he was responsible for the organization of workshops, residencies and public lectures/encounters with internationally renowned media artists and of co-productions with major cultural institutions and cultural TV networks such as the Centre Georges Pompidou, Le Musée d'Orsay, the Festival d'Arles, the International Video Festival of Montbéliard and Canal+. He held the post until leaving in 1987 to form the MMAP (Music, Media Art and Photography).

During this period be continued to work on several series of new works including the dichromatic Primate Series first exhibited in at the Marcuse Pfeifer Gallery in 1985 and later included in the exhibition SPLENDEURS ET MISÈRES DU CORPS curated by Pierre Borhan and Jean-Luc Monterosso at the Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris as part of the 1988 Biennial Month of Photography in Paris. The exhibition featured work from a selection of celebrated photographers from all over the world and travelled from Paris to the Fribourg Museum for the International Triennial of Photography in Switzerland in 1989.

MacLeay left the photographic field in the1990s to dedicate himself completely to musical composition for contemporary dance and video art as well as for his musical recherché group PRIVATE CIRCUS with whom he recorded two CDs on the iconic French indie label Sordide Sentimental in the 90s. Analogue photography was unable to adequately respond to MacLeay’s desire for high quality multi-layering, image fragmentation and precise colour palette control. He would return to photography in 2003/2004 when the digital revolution in the visual arts had caught up with the state of the art in the digital music domain.