David Kordansky Gallery in Los Angeles will host “An American Beauty: Grateful Dead 1965–1995,” an exhibition curated by photographer Jay Blakesberg and his daughter Ricki, tied to the band’s 60th anniversary. The show features monumental-scale works by eight photographers drawn from the Retro Photo Archive, which contains over 100,000 film photos of the Grateful Dead and other pop-culture figures. A companion book will be released on Jerry Garcia’s birthday in August.
The exhibition matters because it bridges the worlds of music and visual art through the lens of a major gallerist who is also a lifelong Deadhead, David Kordansky. It highlights how a grassroots social media project during the pandemic evolved into a living archive and a gallery show, underscoring the enduring cultural impact of the Grateful Dead and the power of photography to preserve and reinterpret countercultural history for new audiences.