The Great Picture Travels to the Land of the Great Wall

Print from the world’s largest camera makes its international debut this month in Beijing

March 14, 2011 – IRVINE, California – The Great Picture, with its ghostly reflection of the shuttered Marine Corps Air Station El Toro, made its international debut March 8 at the Art Museum at Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing. Six local photographers made the world’s largest silver gelatin print using the world’s largest camera, both recognized by the Guinness Book of World’s Records.

Marine Corps Air Station El Toro Building #115 once served as an F-18 fighter plane hangar, but in 2006 the members of The Legacy Project transformed the building into a camera obscura. The work is part of the project’s ongoing quest to document the transition of the former base into the Orange County Great Park. To date, the project has amassed more than 200,000 images.

“The Great Picture is significant not only in scale, but also in capturing the essence of the former Marine Corps Air Station El Toro,” said Beth Krom, Chair of the Orange County Great Park Corporation Board. “We value our partnership with the Legacy Project and congratulate them on the international debut of this important piece of cultural history.”

The Great Picture demanded great quantities of supplies and labor. The group of photographers hand-applied 80 liters of gelatin silver halide emulsion to a seamless 3,375-square-foot canvas substrate custom-made in Germany. Development was done in a custom Olympic pool-sized developing tray using ten high volume submersible pumps and 1,800 gallons of black and white chemicals. The image is three stories high by eleven stories wide.

The photograph was created in the summer of 2006 by six well-known photographic artists known as The Legacy Project, aided by 400 volunteers, artists and experts. The Legacy Project is the late Jerry Burchfield, Mark Chamberlain, Jacques Garnier, Rob Johnson, Doug McCulloh, and Clayton Spada.

“It is quite fitting that the Great Picture will have its international debut in China where the camera obscura was first conceived,” said Jacques Garnier, Legacy Project, who is in China for the exhibition along with the Legacy Project team. “The Central Academy of Fine Arts in Beijing is one of the few museum spaces in the world large enough to fully display this enormous piece of photo history.”

The Great Picture’s significance has been recognized worldwide. It has been featured in hundreds of publications from art journals such as Art in America, Photographie, AfterImage, Juxtapoz and Black and White Magazine. It has been featured in newspapers such as The Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Der Spiegel and The Guardian.

For more information go to www.legacyphotoproject.com.

About the Great Park
The Orange County Great Park, with its 1,347-acre master plan, is the focal point of the redevelopment of the publicly-owned portion of the 4,700-acre former Marine Corps Air Station, El Toro. The Great Park is currently 27.5 acres and includes an iconic tethered helium balloon that rises 400 feet in the air, providing an aerial view of Park development. A $70 million development plan to expand the Park to more than 200 acres is currently underway. The plan will build out a core section of the Park for the most immediate and wide-ranging public benefit, including the initial components of the sports park, a 114-acre agricultural area, and an art and culture exhibition space. For more information, please go to www.ocgp.org

Press Contact:
Jenn Starnes
Public Information Officer
Orange County Great Park Corporation
(949) 724-6574