Graduating from The Cooper Union School of Art, Stephen Barker’s editorial work has appeared in Vanity Fair, Italian Vogue, Aperture, ARTnews, Out, Details, POZ, and Wolkenkratzer.
Responding to the AIDS crisis, he managed ACTUP’s Brooklyn Needle Exchange in 1991-92, and photographed Nightswimming, NYC 1993-94, published as a monograph by Twin Palms (Nightswimming, 1999).
With solo exhibitions in New York, Boston, Paris, and Zurich, he has also taught at The Cooper Union and ICP.
His work is in the collections of the SF Museum of Modern Art, the NY Public Library’s Collection of Prints & Drawings, the Museum of the City of New York, and the Center for Creative Photography, Arizona.
Most recently, his project Restoration* was shown at Cologne’s Museum Ludwig in the show The Eighth Square and The ACT UP Portraits: Activists & Avatars was shown at Daniel Cooney Fine Art, NY.
He lives and works on New York’s Lower East Side.
Inquiries:
STEPHEN BARKER
BORN
1956 Riverside, California. Lives and works in New York City
EDUCATION
1980 BFA, Cooper Union, New York
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
2017 Daniel Cooney Fine Art, New York
2008 Bernard Toale Gallery, Boston
2002 Galerie Schedler, Zurich
2000 Bernard Toale Gallery, Boston
Galerie Schedler, Zurich
1999 Galerie Rabouan Moussion, Paris
1998 Galerie Rabouan Moussion, Paris
1997 Morris-Healy Gallery, New York
PUBLIC COLLECTIONS
The New York Public Library, Collection of Prints & Drawings, New York
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, California
The Museum of the City of New York
International Center of Photography/ICP, New York
Center for Creative Photography, Arizona
Fundación Televisa, Mexico
SELECTED GROUP EXHIBITIONS
2023/24 “Downtown Amigos y Amigas,” Palazzo Gallery, Brescia, Italy. Travels to Venice (catalogue)
2010 “Exposed,” Tate Modern, London. Travels to SFMoMA and Walker Arts Center in 2011.
2006 “The Eighth Square,” Ludwig Museum, Cologne, Germany; Curated by Frank Wagner
2002 “Sexuality & Voyeurism,” Wayne State University; curated by Sandra Dupree
2001 “Rocks and Trees,” Photographic Resource Center at Boston University
Curated by David Armstrong
2000 Patricia Sweetow Gallery, San Francisco, California (Two person show)
“Horse,” Ron Judish Fine Arts, Denver, Colorado
1999 “Emerging Images,” Susquehanna Art Museum, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
1998 Vaknin/Schwartz Gallery, Atlanta, Georgia
“Male,” Wessel O’Connor Gallery, New York; curated by Vince Aletti
1997 “Evidence: Photography and Site,” Wexner Center for the Arts, Columbus, Ohio, (catalogue)
Travels to Cranbrook Museum, Bloomfield Hills, Michigan and The Power Plant, Toronto
“People Gathering, Recent Photographs,” Mark Moore Gallery, Santa Monica, California
1996 “100 Photographs,” American Fine Arts, Co., New York
“Recent Acquisitions, 1992-1996,” Center for Creative Photography, University of Arizona
Tucson; curated by Trudy Wilner Stack
1995 Regen Projects, Los Angeles, California (Three person show)
“unfocused,” Galerie Objectiv, Cologne, Germany; curated by Aron Neubert
“Bed,” Hotel Nurenberger Eck, Berlin, Germany; curated by Piotr Nathan
1994 Regen Projects, Gramercy International Art Fair, Chateau Marmont, Los Angeles;
Curated by Jack Pierson
1993 “L’Amérique de Nan Goldin—News From Home,” Fnac Montparnasse, Paris;
Curated by Nan Goldin; travels throughout France until November 1997
“Saint in the City,” Tom Cugliani Gallery, New York; curated by Jack Pierson
1991 “From Desire… A Queer Diary,” Richard F. Brush Art Gallery, St. Lawrence University,
Canton, New York; curated by Nan Goldin
TEACHING
2014-16 The Cooper Union, New York
2005 Bennington College, Bennington, Vermont
1998-99 International Center of Photography, New York
PUBLISHED PROJECTS
2003 Eternidad Fugitiva, Alfonso Morales Carrillo, Fundación Televisa; Santa Fe, Mexico, pp.100-01.
2001 American Photographs 1900-2000, James Danziger, NY: Assouline Press, pl. 216.
Columbia: A Journal of Literature & Art, Spring/Summer #35, pp.176-7; Healy, editor.
1999 Nightswimming, [monograph] Stephen Barker, Santa Fe, NM: Twin Palms Publishers.
Aperture, “Explorations: Nine Portfolios,” Winter, Issue 154, pp.60-67.
1996 XXX Fruit, “Diaries,” June, Issue 3, pp. 54-55; d’Adesky, Gagliostro, editors.
STUD: Architectures of Masculinity, Princeton University Press, pp.284-291; Sanders, editor.
1994 Aktuell: das Magazin der Deutschen AIDS-Hilfe, “Schuld,” November, No.8, pp.14-28;
Ulmann Hakert, editor.
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
2024 Shanay Jhaveri, ed., “Night Fever,” with essay by Drew Sawyer, pp. 243-254
2017 Ellyn Kail, “Painful, Beautiful, Unforgettable Photos from the ACT UP Community,” Feature Shoot
Trenton Straub, “Moments of Stillness,” [Interview] POZ Magazine, September, pp 26-27
Rothman/Ronk, “Capturing the Wild Sadness of the AIDS Crisis at Its Height,” Time Magazine
2008 [Artist’s statement] EXIT Magazine, 29, pp. 66-71
2002 John Paul Ricco, The Logic of the Lure, University of Chicago Press, pp.14-16.
2000 Peter Nesbett, South End News, The five-minute romance at Bernard Toale, 4/27, pp.19; 23.
1999 Lynne Tillman, Art on Paper, Nude Notes, Volume 3, No.3, pp.29-31.
1998 Chrystel Egal, Beaux Arts, Stephen Barker, March, No.166, p.25.
Justin Spring, ARTFORUM, Review, February, p.94.
1997 Bill Arning, OUT, Camera Obscura, November, p.60.
Aaron Betsky, The New York Times, An Emblem of Crisis Made the World See the Body Anew,
Sunday Arts & Leisure, November 30, p.1; 44.
Lynn Crawford, Metro Times, (Columbus,OH) Going Down For Air, November 19-25.
Kim Leddy, Columbus Alive, (OH) Artifacts in Emulsion, February 19-25, p.7.
1995 Susanne Boecker, Kolner Stadt-Anzeiger, Kein platz für die Schwachen, November 3.
1994 Thomas Alfermann, Potsdam, AIDS ist für die meisten Menschen immer noch ein schwules
Thema - doch jeder kann betroffen sein, December 14.
Claudia Palma, Markische Zeitung, Von der Lust auf Liebe, November 29.
1993 Vince Aletti, Le Jour, (La Nuit), Chère Nan – News From Home, November 5.
Guerrin, Le Monde, L’Amérique de Nan Goldin a Paris: L’Image Coup de Poing,
December 15.