Magic Hour

I first heard of Marcelo Yanez through a mutual friend, Bryson Rand, when he took out this tabloid format publication called Newspaper to show me. In Bryson’s usual humility, he didn’t even mention the photo of his that graced the cover, but Instead, wanted to show me other work inside that he was excited about, and especially about who put this all together.

At 19 years old, Marcelo Yanez took on a project. He had discovered a publication from the early 70’s called Newspaper that featured the work of photographers in the downtown New York scene. He fell in love wit it, and began to work on a revival of it with contemporary artists. In a looseleaf insert that came with the first issue of his revival, Marcelo wrote about treating Newspaper as an alternative exhibition space, and letting other queer artists know that if they’re in a particular geographical area where queer spaces don’t exist, to get in touch, so we can form a community. I remember reading that and feeling such a generosity and initiative in that offering. It both impressed and charmed me, and I knew this person was doing something special.

While he was working on Newspaper, he was studying art history ar NYU, with minors in German and Medieval studies, was working at the Fales library doing archival work, and he was also making his own photographs. Currently, Marcelo is a PhD student in the department of art and art history at Stanford University studying American art.

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