Ben Grace was commissioned to capture the gallery imagery for More than Stories, a trilogy of films by artist Anya Lewin exploring family history, Jewish memory and the connections between personal stories, cinema and public archives.
The trilogy brings together With Heartfelt Gratitude for the Painless Treatment (2008), Chez Paulette on the Sunset Strip (2013) and Fez: The Royal Scent (2019), which was created specifically for the exhibition and completed the trilogy of installations presented together for the first time.
Spanning three cities central to Lewin’s family history — Berlin, Cairo and Los Angeles — the films reconstruct fragments of family stories through elaborate built sets, archival material and historical references. From her grandparents’ dental practice in 1920s Berlin, to a family perfume shop in Cairo and a European-style coffee house on Los Angeles’ Sunset Strip, Lewin combines fact and fiction to explore the ways personal and collective histories are remembered, reconstructed and passed between generations.
Ben’s photography documented the exhibition installation and individual works within the gallery, capturing the distinctive sets, objects and cinematic elements that extend beyond the films themselves and into the exhibition space.