Garden State Lens

In this major exhibition, candid photography—unscripted, unposed images taken from everyday life—by eleven contemporary artists explore the lives lived in the nation’s most densely populated and ethnically diverse state. Garden State Lens presents scenes of New Jerseyans going about their everyday lives. We see them raise their families, earn a living, come together as a community, and enjoy the state’s great outdoors. Powerful images—some printed at titanic scale, others more modestly sized—upend the typecast idea of our state through popular television shows and social media. More than 100 photographs on view instead offer nuanced and authentic glimpses of the incredible human tapestry that makes contemporary life in the state so exceptional.