Part of the Hillman Photography Initiative

Join us for the world premiere of Discarded, which delves into the work of Joachim Schmid, a German artist who has spent the past 30 years roaming flea markets and city streets to retrieve photographs that have been discarded by their creators and users. See how he has pieced together an anti-museum of over 1000 images that would otherwise never have been seen, and created a new context for their visual consumption. Fascinated by photographs as physical objects, Schmid traces the layers of meaning that have built up over time as they have been handled, scuffed, marked, and written upon. Paired with his newest work, dedicated to sifting through the visual detritus of the digital world, this video examines what happens when images consigned to the physical and virtual trash heap are given new life.

After the screening, participate in a conversation between Schmid and Arthur Ou, creative director of The Invisible Photograph documentary series and an Agent of the Hillman Photography Initiative, as they examine how the act of collecting, recontextualizing, and recirculating previously unrelated images deepens our understanding of the lifecycles of images, from creation to loss and rediscovery.