I was lucky enough to get to meet Debra Klomp Ching and Darren Ching in their 111 Front street gallery in Dumbo just one week before their first show at AIPAD. I was even more lucky to be able to peek at the mock up they made of their booth – it looks incredible. Can’t wait to be at the opening party!
From their first encounter with photography to the opening of their gallery…
Debra remembers the retrospective of Robert Mapplethorpe at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam in 1987 as being a turning point in her life. It was her first photography exhibit, she says she stayed for hours and found it “completely magical”. A little later she studied MA in critical history and theory of photography in England. Since then, her entire working life has been involved with photography one way or another: she was a teacher, officer of the Arts Council of England, curator for shows all over the world, reviewer for major portfolio reviews, juror for major awards…
Darren was born and raised in Honolulu, Hawaii. He says he can’t remember a time in his life when he was not looking at photography. He went to art school in San Francisco, majored in painting, moved to New York as a designer and worked in various magazines before he got his position as creative director of Photo District News Magazine in 1998. He adds that he is not a photographer but loves more than anything else looking at photography, judging it, talking about it. “It rocks my boat”.
They met at one of the 2004 Rhubarb Rhubarb portfolio review in Birgmingham, England. On the last day of the event, there was a print auction in which Darren and Debra were sitting at the same table. They ended up biding on the same print (Blind by Magali Nougarède) against one another. Darren got the bid. At the end, Darren explains that because he did not really have space and time to take the print with him or prepare it to ship to New York, he asked Debra if she would take it back to NY for him. She did and kept it for 3 month. They started dating the day she delivered the print to Darren in October 2004. They got married in October 2006 and felt solid enough in their vision, respect and taste to open their gallery in October 2007.
A good memory…
A bad memory…
Debra explains that the good and bad memory happened at the same time on the opening night of their gallery for Simon Roberts’ show Motherland in 2007. They expected about a hundred people and ended up being three hundred in their 111 Front street space. Debra tells how “terrifying” and at the same time “extremely exhilarating” that night was. She adds that some people came to the event but had to come back the next week because they couldn’t make it into the space that night.
A photograph that has a special importance in their life…
Blind from the series Toeing The Line by Magali Nougarède. The famous print that created the magic.
On their bedroom wall…
Their bedroom walls are completely blank.
Thank you Debra and Darren!
Stéphanie de Rougé
Klompching Gallery
111 Front Street, Suite 206
Brooklyn, NY 11201
Telephone: +1 212 796 2070
Email: [email protected]
Gallery Hours: Wed — Sat, 11am — 6pm
Extended Hours: 1st Thursdays, 11am — 8:30pm
Private appointments available upon request
