You may recognize Michael M. Koehler’s name from his extraordinary photo essay documenting a canoe run down the Schuylkill River on the cover of the City Paper in April.  He’ll show a different side of his work with PARADE at the Salon on June 10th at the Laurie Beechman Cabaret (601 S. Broad St.).

Born and raised in Philadelphia, Michael M. Koehler started photographing on the streets, in local barbershops, churches and other community establishments where he learned that making photographs was based on the relationship that he shared with his subjects.  After receiving a B.F.A from New York University Tisch School of the Arts in 2005, he traveled the country and abroad to photograph, interacting with both the people and the landscape. He has worked as a photojournalist for the Philadelphia City Paper and the Philadelphia Tribune. His work has been published in numerous magazines, such as American Photo and Complex Magazine and he has shown his work in galleries and museums, such as the Leica Gallery in New York, the Woodmere Art Museum in Philadelphia, Subliminal Projects Gallery in Los Angeles and the Sandro Chia Studio in Rome. Most recently, Michael was awarded a Jurors award at Perkins Center for the Arts.

PARADE is a selection Black and White Gelatin Silver photographs that focuses on human nature and the relationship people share with each other and there landscape, both urban and rural. The way the story unfolds is in the mutual way we see each other, the teller and the listener, the parade and the viewer. The honoring and witnessing that the viewer gives to the characters in the parade and the honoring and witnessing that comes back is a way of life. I have paraded, joined parades, and people have joined my parade. When we are authentically, naturally engaged with another human, we are at our most vulnerable state and mutual trust evolves. The experience is the true gift. For this exchange to occur, we both must become open, a gentle process that sometimes is questioned and denied. The photograph is the evidence, the data of this exchange. In this ritual, life becomes a parade of human engagement. We are nothing without each other.

See more of his work here: MichaelMKoehler.com

Join us on Wednesday, June 10th for Koehler’s Salon presentation along with three other artists exploring facets of memoir and documentary art:

Sarah McEneaney shares a series of thoughtfully rendered personal narrative paintings covering the flux of human experience ranging from the mundane to the acutely traumatic. Read more here.

Stephanie Yuhas reads from “American Goulash,” a collection of stories about growing up a first-born American daughter to an all-Transylvanian family.  American Goulash

Nathan Manske will present selections of “true stories by gay people from all over” collected on his website Imfromdriftwood.com

The Salon takes place at the Laurie Beechman Cabaret (601 S. Broad St.) and runs from 7:3opm to 9:30pm
Admission is $8, seating is limited, and we typically sell out!  Please buy your tickets in advance.