Cathedral gallery features photos of cities

By Jerry Hames July 25, 2008 [Episcopal Life] David Bergholz has his "eye on the city." That's the title of the latest art exhibit at The Gallery at Trinity Cathedral in Cleveland that will display the photographer's work taken in 12 major cities of the world.

"I have always had my eye on cities. I have watched them evolve, expand, build up, clean up and decay," he said in a statement accompanying the exhibit of more than 50 photographs that opened today (July 18) and will continue until the end of August.
During the past year, Bergholz has begun to document aspects of Cleveland's urban landscape. "I am fascinated by this still-struggling, post-industrial town and the special character of its physical space."

The exhibit will include about a half-dozen of Bergholz's photos of Cleveland. The remainder is a collection from his ramblings through the streets of cities such as New York, Toronto, Sarajevo, Tel Aviv and Bosnia-Herzegovina.

Abandoned houses, city skylines, enticing store window displays, wall graffiti, industrial scenes and construction work are included among the general themes in which Bergholz has grouped his photos for the exhibition.

Attracted by cities' vitality
Bergholz has spent most of his career in the nonprofit sector in urban health care, or housing or schooling issues, working for the well-being of cities and "hurling what energy and resources I had to make them better places for all their citizens to live and prosper in," he said.

"Cities are engines and repositories of creativity and vitality, decline and destruction. In them we see what makes the human experience both hopeful and dismaying."
His attraction to urban areas, he said, comes from his childhood days in Chicago, when he would bicycle across the city, looking at the architecture, and in Pittsburgh as he headed into junior high.

A camera has been an important part of his life since he first borrowed a Brownie from a friend when he was 10. "My father, who was in the book business, would bring the annual collection of U.S. Camera issues home each year, and I would wear out these volumes poring over the images," he said.

"I began dark room work in junior high school and have been an avid amateur all of my life. I have always looked for -- and found -- ways to let my passion for my image-making and that of others flourish in my life."

During his career, Bergholz was often in charge of producing annual reports for his employers, and he would often hire young, emerging photographers to dress up these reports. As executive director of the George Gund Foundation, a nonprofit philanthropic institution founded by a former cathedral warden and vestry member of Trinity, he could hire the best photographers and included in the foundation's annual reports photographic essays taken by well-known fine art photographers.

"I've always like the city scene," he mused as he ticked off places where he has worked. "I've never stopped taking pictures," said Bergholz, who described sorting through shoeboxes stuffed with Polaroid prints when he finally had time to inventory his photos upon his retirement five years ago. He has used these old Polaroids to create colleges that now vie for attention with the digital prints on his website.

Art engages community
The Gallery at Trinity was created in 2002 as part of the cathedral's renovation of Trinity Commons. The gallery hosts four to six exhibits of art from the community, civic groups, the cathedral and the Diocese of Ohio each year.

Located on Euclid Avenue, historically known in the city as Millionaires' Row, the gallery was created from space that was originally the studio of Louis Rorimer (1872-1939), Cleveland's first interior decorator and principal in the nationally known Rorimer Brooks Company.

"The Gallery at Trinity Cathedral displays visual art that reflects and engages our community," said Rebecca Wilson of the cathedral. "Each year we host diverse exhibits related to the church, the city and programs at Trinity Cathedral. We want to promote and enhance the mission of Trinity Commons by using diverse expressions of the visual arts that will reflect, engage and inspire the community that it serves."

The Gallery at Trinity Commons is located at Trinity Cathedral, 2230 Euclid Ave., Cleveland. To read more about the photographer and see his portfolio, go to: www.davidbergholz.com.