THE TANGIBLE PHOTOGRAPH - Curator Blue Mitchell > Honorable Mentions: Peg Shaw, Charlotta Hauksdottir, Diane Fenster , LM Wood & Mary Dondero
Honorable Mentions: Peg Shaw, Charlotta Hauksdottir, Diane Fenster , LM Wood & Mary Dondero
90 YEARS 1 by Peg Shaw
Honorable Mention
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Honorable Mention
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Peg Shaw says, "90 Years ago my great uncle picked up his 16mm movie camera and filmed a family gathering. For years I’m sure the projected figures recalled fond memories for the viewers. But now, with no information on who what why, they are just the play of light and shadow. No sound. No color. I only recognize my grandmother’s smile.
The film breaks the afternoon down into frames per second, and within each frame is a story, and within each story very carefully chosen words. Like zooming into a photograph until it breaks down into pixels: moments turn into flickers.
Smile for the camera, smile at each other, hold a baby, hold hands - the intimacy catches my breath. This is where this work comes from: a deep intrigue for how we can connect across time and space. The way we can be so moved by an experience that isn’t ours. The way we can truly care for people we don’t know. Wings, flowers, grasses, roots become a physical overlay of how these connections could be revealed if only we could see all the layers of a moment at once.
This work is not about a home movie - this happened and then that happened. It’s about a quiet burst - all of this happened."
Peg Shaw’s work has always been an exploration in multi-media including photography, video, film, sound, and mixed media such as paint, charcoal, dirt, leaves, thorns, petals, eggshells, hair, thread, wire, and glass.
Her work has been shown nationally including solo exhibitions in Chicago and New York, and has won numerous awards in both photography and video, including awards from the Illinois Arts Council and Arts Midwest/NEA Regional. She is an Associate Professor in Photography/Video at Parkland College in Champaign, IL where she was recently awarded the 2016 Illinois Community College Trustees Association Outstanding Full-Time Faculty Award.
Born in Oak Park, Illinois, Shaw received her Master of Fine Arts in Photography from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Shaw lives in the woods with her family in a timberframe home they built by hand. She is a drummer that only makes noise in her basement. She is the middle child of five. She still loves her friends from junior high. She has a lake in Michigan that runs in her veins.
www.pegshaw.com
The film breaks the afternoon down into frames per second, and within each frame is a story, and within each story very carefully chosen words. Like zooming into a photograph until it breaks down into pixels: moments turn into flickers.
Smile for the camera, smile at each other, hold a baby, hold hands - the intimacy catches my breath. This is where this work comes from: a deep intrigue for how we can connect across time and space. The way we can be so moved by an experience that isn’t ours. The way we can truly care for people we don’t know. Wings, flowers, grasses, roots become a physical overlay of how these connections could be revealed if only we could see all the layers of a moment at once.
This work is not about a home movie - this happened and then that happened. It’s about a quiet burst - all of this happened."
Peg Shaw’s work has always been an exploration in multi-media including photography, video, film, sound, and mixed media such as paint, charcoal, dirt, leaves, thorns, petals, eggshells, hair, thread, wire, and glass.
Her work has been shown nationally including solo exhibitions in Chicago and New York, and has won numerous awards in both photography and video, including awards from the Illinois Arts Council and Arts Midwest/NEA Regional. She is an Associate Professor in Photography/Video at Parkland College in Champaign, IL where she was recently awarded the 2016 Illinois Community College Trustees Association Outstanding Full-Time Faculty Award.
Born in Oak Park, Illinois, Shaw received her Master of Fine Arts in Photography from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and her Bachelor of Fine Arts in Painting from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Shaw lives in the woods with her family in a timberframe home they built by hand. She is a drummer that only makes noise in her basement. She is the middle child of five. She still loves her friends from junior high. She has a lake in Michigan that runs in her veins.
www.pegshaw.com
TOPOGRAPHY STUDY VI by Charlotta Hauksdottir
Honorable Mention
(Click on image for larger view)
Honorable Mention
(Click on image for larger view)
Charlotta Maria Hauksdottir says, "The physical space of landscapes can be closely tied to a person’s identity, sense of being, and infused with personal history. The composite, textured landscapes in the series “Imprints” are a re-creation of places and scenes from an estranged homeland. Several sheets of photographic paper with variable cutouts are layered together imitating landforms that have formed over time. The visible and obscured parts of the landscape suggest the interplay of effects between man and nature, as well as the imperfections of memory, with the bifurcated textures emphasizing the mind’s inability to retain and fully comprehend its environment. The discontinuity between the images also induces the viewer to draw on their own experiences to complete the work."
Charlotta María Hauksdóttir is an Icelandic artist based in California, working primarily in photography. Residing in the USA for over 15 years, she still draws inspiration from her home country Iceland. Her work centers around the unique connection one has to places and moments in time, and how memories embody and elevate those connections. Charlotta graduated from the San Francisco Art Institute with an MFA in Photography, in 2004, and received a BA in Photography from the Istituto Europeo di Design in Rome, Italy, in 1997.
Her work has been exhibited around the world, with solo exhibitions in the USA, Russia, and Iceland, most recently at the Reykjavik Museum of Photography. She has received a number of awards and has been published in several magazines and books. Her work is part of numerous public and private collections all over the world, including corporate collections, the latest acquisition being by Stanford Health Care.
Solo Exhibitions:
2017 A Matter of Some Moments, Ramskram Gallery, Reykjavik, Iceland
2016 Outlook, Reykjavík Museum of Photography, Reykjavik, Iceland
2014 Moments, VI International Festival of Photography PhotoVisa, Krasnodar, Russia
Group Exhibitions:
2017
Contemporary Landscape, Marin Museum of Contemporary Art, CA, USA
Kuala Lumpur International Photoawards 2017, WHITEBOX Gallery, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Art of Living Photography Gallery Awards, ACCI Gallery, Berkeley, CA, USA
Reflect & Engage, The Image Flow, Mill Valley, CA, USA
FÍSL 2017 Samtímaljósmyndun, Miklagardur, Höfn í Hornafirði, Iceland
Public Alchemy II, Cubberley Community Center, Palo Alto, CA, USA
Cascade, Nordic Innovation House, Palo Alto, CA, USA
4th Annual Juried Art Show, Piedmont Center for the Arts, Piedmont, CA, USA
www.charlottamh.com
Charlotta María Hauksdóttir is an Icelandic artist based in California, working primarily in photography. Residing in the USA for over 15 years, she still draws inspiration from her home country Iceland. Her work centers around the unique connection one has to places and moments in time, and how memories embody and elevate those connections. Charlotta graduated from the San Francisco Art Institute with an MFA in Photography, in 2004, and received a BA in Photography from the Istituto Europeo di Design in Rome, Italy, in 1997.
Her work has been exhibited around the world, with solo exhibitions in the USA, Russia, and Iceland, most recently at the Reykjavik Museum of Photography. She has received a number of awards and has been published in several magazines and books. Her work is part of numerous public and private collections all over the world, including corporate collections, the latest acquisition being by Stanford Health Care.
Solo Exhibitions:
2017 A Matter of Some Moments, Ramskram Gallery, Reykjavik, Iceland
2016 Outlook, Reykjavík Museum of Photography, Reykjavik, Iceland
2014 Moments, VI International Festival of Photography PhotoVisa, Krasnodar, Russia
Group Exhibitions:
2017
Contemporary Landscape, Marin Museum of Contemporary Art, CA, USA
Kuala Lumpur International Photoawards 2017, WHITEBOX Gallery, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Art of Living Photography Gallery Awards, ACCI Gallery, Berkeley, CA, USA
Reflect & Engage, The Image Flow, Mill Valley, CA, USA
FÍSL 2017 Samtímaljósmyndun, Miklagardur, Höfn í Hornafirði, Iceland
Public Alchemy II, Cubberley Community Center, Palo Alto, CA, USA
Cascade, Nordic Innovation House, Palo Alto, CA, USA
4th Annual Juried Art Show, Piedmont Center for the Arts, Piedmont, CA, USA
www.charlottamh.com
HOUSE by Diane Fenster
Honorable Mention
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Honorable Mention
(Click on image for larger view)
Diane Fenster says of this work, 'Secrets of the Magdalen Laundries', A photo installation with sound environment by Michael McNabb,
"Fantasy is sanctuary.
Secrets of the Magdalen Laundries explores the theme of imagination in the inner life. Dreaming, reverie, and fantasy are ways of being that make the reality of circumstances more tolerable.
As a point of departure, I was drawn to the history of the Magdalen Laundries. These convent industries in Ireland existed from the mid 19th century until the late 20th century. The Magdalen Laundries institutionalized women who were smeared with the reputation of being immoral, or who were indigent, and kept them imprisoned through the social machinations of the Church. These misused women lived in punitive labor, lost to both their families and themselves. Henceforth, they became invisible, concealed beyond the margins of society.
For me, the imagination is a threshold to an inner world. I uncover the tension between an image that conjures its mutable revelations and the idee fixee. My work embodies the hidden poetry of the ordinary, making visible what previously was hidden.
At the boundaries of the visible exists the invisible.
In my images these women live in a private world of desire, longing, and unreachable fulfillment, forced into a mundane ritual of service without pleasure or amenities. Their vitality and eros, bound by the superficial morality of the Church, reemerges as images on the sheets that they repetitiously wash, a reminder of their stained existence.
They dreamed until the secret images were burned onto the sheets.
Sheets facilitate dreaming. They enfold the body, carry its warmth, desire, perfume, and wrap it in death. I work on discarded sheets to give form to the imagination that releases desire in spite of circumstances. The sheets move from matter to metaphysics, reminding us of the body and its dreams. The portraits from the Magdalen Laundries appear and disappear as you move around them. Viewed from the oblique perspective, the images vanish like the women lost in time. Facing them, they assume their own dreaming existence."
Diane Fenster's art first received notice during the era of early experimentations with digital imaging. Her work has been called an important voice in the development of a true digital aesthetic. She views herself as an alchemist, using digital tools to delve into fundamental human issues. Her work is literary and emotional, full of symbolism and multiple layers of meaning. Her images have appeared in numerous publications on digital art.
She has been guest lecturer at many seminars and conferences, her work has been internationally exhibited and is part of museum, corporate and private collections. Her images appear in numerous publications on digital art including the APERTURE monograph METAMORPHOSES: PHOTOGRAPHY IN THE ELECTRONIC AGE, WOMEN, ART AND TECHNOLOGY published by MIT press, ART IN THE DIGITAL AGE edited by Bruce Wands, School of Visual Art, NYC and her work has been internationally exhibited and is part of museum, corporate and private collections.
Recently however, Fenster has been moving away from the digital photomontage style that has brought her so much recognition and is venturing into an exploration of starker imagery that has its roots in toy camera photography, alternative process and photo-encaustic. Her work was exhibited in the 4th Biennale of Fine Art and Documentary Photography in Berlin, she was a finalist in the Alternative Process category of the 9th Pollux Awards, a finalist in the Alternative Process and Portraits categories of the 7th Julia Margaret Cameron Awards, a finalist in the Alternative Process and Fine Art categories of the 8th Julia Margaret Cameron Awards, included in the Illuminate exhibit curated by Elizabeth Avedon, the Alternative Process exhibit juried by Christopher James at the Center for Fine Art Photography and published in the DIFFUSION ANNUAL 2016. Finalist in both the Fine Art and Nude & Figure Categories of the Second Charles Dodson Awards. Recent exhibits include FotofFoto gallery’s 13th National Competition, Let There be Light and Shadow at the Umbrella Arts Gallery in New York, Photography as Response at The Center for Fine Art Photography, Intimate Portraits exhibit at the SE Center for Photography, The Essence of Monochrome International Photo Competition sponsored byThe Stockholm Diary and exhibited in Budapest, SohoPhoto Alternative Process exhibit at the SohoPhoto Gallery in New York.
www.lensculture.com/diane-fenster
Honorable Mention continued- click on arrow at top and bottom of page:
"Fantasy is sanctuary.
Secrets of the Magdalen Laundries explores the theme of imagination in the inner life. Dreaming, reverie, and fantasy are ways of being that make the reality of circumstances more tolerable.
As a point of departure, I was drawn to the history of the Magdalen Laundries. These convent industries in Ireland existed from the mid 19th century until the late 20th century. The Magdalen Laundries institutionalized women who were smeared with the reputation of being immoral, or who were indigent, and kept them imprisoned through the social machinations of the Church. These misused women lived in punitive labor, lost to both their families and themselves. Henceforth, they became invisible, concealed beyond the margins of society.
For me, the imagination is a threshold to an inner world. I uncover the tension between an image that conjures its mutable revelations and the idee fixee. My work embodies the hidden poetry of the ordinary, making visible what previously was hidden.
At the boundaries of the visible exists the invisible.
In my images these women live in a private world of desire, longing, and unreachable fulfillment, forced into a mundane ritual of service without pleasure or amenities. Their vitality and eros, bound by the superficial morality of the Church, reemerges as images on the sheets that they repetitiously wash, a reminder of their stained existence.
They dreamed until the secret images were burned onto the sheets.
Sheets facilitate dreaming. They enfold the body, carry its warmth, desire, perfume, and wrap it in death. I work on discarded sheets to give form to the imagination that releases desire in spite of circumstances. The sheets move from matter to metaphysics, reminding us of the body and its dreams. The portraits from the Magdalen Laundries appear and disappear as you move around them. Viewed from the oblique perspective, the images vanish like the women lost in time. Facing them, they assume their own dreaming existence."
Diane Fenster's art first received notice during the era of early experimentations with digital imaging. Her work has been called an important voice in the development of a true digital aesthetic. She views herself as an alchemist, using digital tools to delve into fundamental human issues. Her work is literary and emotional, full of symbolism and multiple layers of meaning. Her images have appeared in numerous publications on digital art.
She has been guest lecturer at many seminars and conferences, her work has been internationally exhibited and is part of museum, corporate and private collections. Her images appear in numerous publications on digital art including the APERTURE monograph METAMORPHOSES: PHOTOGRAPHY IN THE ELECTRONIC AGE, WOMEN, ART AND TECHNOLOGY published by MIT press, ART IN THE DIGITAL AGE edited by Bruce Wands, School of Visual Art, NYC and her work has been internationally exhibited and is part of museum, corporate and private collections.
Recently however, Fenster has been moving away from the digital photomontage style that has brought her so much recognition and is venturing into an exploration of starker imagery that has its roots in toy camera photography, alternative process and photo-encaustic. Her work was exhibited in the 4th Biennale of Fine Art and Documentary Photography in Berlin, she was a finalist in the Alternative Process category of the 9th Pollux Awards, a finalist in the Alternative Process and Portraits categories of the 7th Julia Margaret Cameron Awards, a finalist in the Alternative Process and Fine Art categories of the 8th Julia Margaret Cameron Awards, included in the Illuminate exhibit curated by Elizabeth Avedon, the Alternative Process exhibit juried by Christopher James at the Center for Fine Art Photography and published in the DIFFUSION ANNUAL 2016. Finalist in both the Fine Art and Nude & Figure Categories of the Second Charles Dodson Awards. Recent exhibits include FotofFoto gallery’s 13th National Competition, Let There be Light and Shadow at the Umbrella Arts Gallery in New York, Photography as Response at The Center for Fine Art Photography, Intimate Portraits exhibit at the SE Center for Photography, The Essence of Monochrome International Photo Competition sponsored byThe Stockholm Diary and exhibited in Budapest, SohoPhoto Alternative Process exhibit at the SohoPhoto Gallery in New York.
www.lensculture.com/diane-fenster
Honorable Mention continued- click on arrow at top and bottom of page:
COLORFUL CREVICE by LM Wood
Honorable Mention
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Honorable Mention
(Click on image for larger view)
LM Wood says, "Blurring of boundaries between craft and fine art and between traditional and contemporary art forms, I seek to explore the distinctions between media, process and function. My interest is in creating hybrid works that exist in the “muddy middle” between various areas of study.
Drawing inspiration from the “mysteries” of the photographic image - the element of memory is important in these works. For similar reasons, I am also drawn to working with textiles. Much like the photograph, textiles also hold memory; either created through the making or in the using of them.
Technologies allow for the mutability of visual imagery like nothing we’ve ever seen before. Going “digital” allows for new ways of seeing, interacting with, and producing works of art. It also raises questions of authorship and the physicality of the artist’s hand. Both the physical and manifestations of physicality is a common thread throughout all my work.
My desire is to make art that tells a story - not only through how a work is made but also what it “says” to the viewer. Resulting in works that become the artifacts of the human experience."
LM Wood is an experimental artist living and working in North Carolina. Originally from Minnesota, she pursued a variety of careers before discovering art in college. She received an MFA in Photography from University of Cincinnati and an MFA in Fibers from Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, IL. Having been educated in a variety of diverse artistic styles and practices, Wood navigates between the domains of art, craft and technology. Her work is a blend of digital technologies and traditional processes, resulting in hybrid works that elevate process and craft to “high art”.
Wood has presented and exhibited her work nationally, including exhibitions at Museum of Design (Atlanta, GA), Center for Craft, Creativity and Design (Asheville, NC) and North Dakota Museum of Art (Grand Forks, ND). She has also won several awards for her experimental works, including a grant from Kentucky Foundation for Women for her earlier research into combining digital technologies and traditional photographic processes and a Visual Arts Fellowship from North Carolina Arts Council for her digitally printed fabric quilts.
She joined the faculty at Elon University (NC) in 2000, where she teaches courses including: Introduction to Intermedia, The Altered Image in Digital Art and Painting with the Computer and The Study of Fibers. Other courses she Other courses she has taught include: Introduction to Digital Art, Static Imaging, Interactive Art, Web Art, Professional Practices and Senior Seminar.
www.eclecticmoose.com/lmwood
TO VIEW EXHIBITION #1 CLICK ON LINK BELOW:
www.laphotocurator.com/the-tangible-photograph-curator-blue-mitchell/exhibition-1/1
Drawing inspiration from the “mysteries” of the photographic image - the element of memory is important in these works. For similar reasons, I am also drawn to working with textiles. Much like the photograph, textiles also hold memory; either created through the making or in the using of them.
Technologies allow for the mutability of visual imagery like nothing we’ve ever seen before. Going “digital” allows for new ways of seeing, interacting with, and producing works of art. It also raises questions of authorship and the physicality of the artist’s hand. Both the physical and manifestations of physicality is a common thread throughout all my work.
My desire is to make art that tells a story - not only through how a work is made but also what it “says” to the viewer. Resulting in works that become the artifacts of the human experience."
LM Wood is an experimental artist living and working in North Carolina. Originally from Minnesota, she pursued a variety of careers before discovering art in college. She received an MFA in Photography from University of Cincinnati and an MFA in Fibers from Southern Illinois University in Carbondale, IL. Having been educated in a variety of diverse artistic styles and practices, Wood navigates between the domains of art, craft and technology. Her work is a blend of digital technologies and traditional processes, resulting in hybrid works that elevate process and craft to “high art”.
Wood has presented and exhibited her work nationally, including exhibitions at Museum of Design (Atlanta, GA), Center for Craft, Creativity and Design (Asheville, NC) and North Dakota Museum of Art (Grand Forks, ND). She has also won several awards for her experimental works, including a grant from Kentucky Foundation for Women for her earlier research into combining digital technologies and traditional photographic processes and a Visual Arts Fellowship from North Carolina Arts Council for her digitally printed fabric quilts.
She joined the faculty at Elon University (NC) in 2000, where she teaches courses including: Introduction to Intermedia, The Altered Image in Digital Art and Painting with the Computer and The Study of Fibers. Other courses she Other courses she has taught include: Introduction to Digital Art, Static Imaging, Interactive Art, Web Art, Professional Practices and Senior Seminar.
www.eclecticmoose.com/lmwood
TO VIEW EXHIBITION #1 CLICK ON LINK BELOW:
www.laphotocurator.com/the-tangible-photograph-curator-blue-mitchell/exhibition-1/1
CIVIL TWILIGHT by Mary Dondero
Honorable Mention
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Honorable Mention
(Click on image for larger view)
Mary Dondero says of her series “The Sky was Blue”, "As it happens I spend many hours driving. This provides me with time to daydream or observe the landscape as I travel through one environment and into another at varying speeds. While driving I’ve noticed that the sky is omnipresent, unpredictable and beautiful.
During one of my daily trips, the ever-changing sky inspired me to create a personal project meant to trace or imply my varying states of mind. I decided to associate skies that are overcast, dreary, bright or blue, with frames of mind and oscillating moods. My creative intention in this project is to visually express my ideas or feelings regarding the constant state of impermanence in which we live.
While pulled over to the side of the road, I used my phone to capture each of the images in this project. To give emphasis to fleeting states of being, I digitally printed the imagery on what seems to be fragile, gampi paper. Japanese gampi is tissue thin paper made from plant fibers and is considered to be a noble fiber noted for its richness and strength.
While processing this work I have intentionally saved accidental rips or printing flaws on the paper as a way of emphasizing chance. To further support or represent transitory states of being, I allow the thin tissue-like paper to crinkle or fold, I then present each image floating in a shadow box. These images are simple captures of the sky that I have selectively edited or cropped while looking through the viewfinder. By deliberately resolving all “photographic” work at the time of capture I literally have no post digital editing to accomplish other than to send the image through the printer. My intention is to create artwork that focuses on abstract images built on reductive color palettes, expressing the ephemeral."
Mary Dondero considers herself to be an interdisciplinary artist. Her works are held in both private and public collections such as, the Naestved International Print Studio in Denmark, the Newport Art Museum in RI and the Zion Human History Museum, Utah.
Dondero is one of the founding artists of Imago Foundation for the Arts and an artist member at Providence Art Club. For the past six years she has served on the Board of Directors for the Bristol Art Museum where she serves as Curator of Exhibitions. Dondero is a tenured Professor of Art at Bridgewater State University in Massachusetts.
www.marydondero.com/photographic.html
TO VIEW EXHIBITION #1 CLICK ON LINK BELOW:
www.laphotocurator.com/the-tangible-photograph-curator-blue-mitchell/exhibition-1/1
During one of my daily trips, the ever-changing sky inspired me to create a personal project meant to trace or imply my varying states of mind. I decided to associate skies that are overcast, dreary, bright or blue, with frames of mind and oscillating moods. My creative intention in this project is to visually express my ideas or feelings regarding the constant state of impermanence in which we live.
While pulled over to the side of the road, I used my phone to capture each of the images in this project. To give emphasis to fleeting states of being, I digitally printed the imagery on what seems to be fragile, gampi paper. Japanese gampi is tissue thin paper made from plant fibers and is considered to be a noble fiber noted for its richness and strength.
While processing this work I have intentionally saved accidental rips or printing flaws on the paper as a way of emphasizing chance. To further support or represent transitory states of being, I allow the thin tissue-like paper to crinkle or fold, I then present each image floating in a shadow box. These images are simple captures of the sky that I have selectively edited or cropped while looking through the viewfinder. By deliberately resolving all “photographic” work at the time of capture I literally have no post digital editing to accomplish other than to send the image through the printer. My intention is to create artwork that focuses on abstract images built on reductive color palettes, expressing the ephemeral."
Mary Dondero considers herself to be an interdisciplinary artist. Her works are held in both private and public collections such as, the Naestved International Print Studio in Denmark, the Newport Art Museum in RI and the Zion Human History Museum, Utah.
Dondero is one of the founding artists of Imago Foundation for the Arts and an artist member at Providence Art Club. For the past six years she has served on the Board of Directors for the Bristol Art Museum where she serves as Curator of Exhibitions. Dondero is a tenured Professor of Art at Bridgewater State University in Massachusetts.
www.marydondero.com/photographic.html
TO VIEW EXHIBITION #1 CLICK ON LINK BELOW:
www.laphotocurator.com/the-tangible-photograph-curator-blue-mitchell/exhibition-1/1
