Hey everyone,
We’re caught in the dead heat of summer, so I hope that this message finds you well and that you’re taking care wherever you may be. I have a lot to share since my previous studio update and I’ll also tell you about some great events and exhibitions I’ve seen over the past few months!
First, I have updated my website to include a selection of photographs in an ‘archive’ format. The images are a freeform collection of portraits, nightlife scenes, landscapes, and photo experiments that I created prior to attending grad school. Many of those pictured are close friends who supported my practice as I was beginning to delve further into photography. It feels useful to look at these images now as I search for the connections and through-lines to my current work.
A few months ago, my series New Intimacies was shortlisted for the Urbanautica Institute Awards — a collection of photographic projects that explore visual anthropology and cultural landscapes. The journal publishes an incredible range of projects and I was thrilled to have my work selected alongside friends Ian Edward White and Margaret LeJeune.
In March, I attended my first national conference for the Society for Photographic Education. The conference was held in Denver, Colorado and the primary purpose of my visit was to give a graduate presentation, which I did alongside two other recent graduates, Viktorsha Uliyanova and Angela Shaffer. This was an amazing opportunity to meet other the photo educators, panelists, and speakers. I was especially interested to learn about the recent video work and use of LiDAR technology by artist Sama Alshaibi during her keynote lecture, An Index of Return. There was also a fascinating panel discussion on the early years of the SPE Women’s Caucus, featuring Martha Rosler, Catherine Lord, and Linda Brooks, and it was moderated by my former professor, Ariel Evans, who has done great scholarship on the activism of these critical photography practitioners.
While in Denver, I participated in SPE’s combined caucus exhibition at the Rocky Mountain College of Art & Design, which was juried by Jess T. Dugan. I also attended portfolio review sessions at the Colorado Photographic Arts Center and saw an incredible exhibition of contemporary indigenous photography at the Denver Art Museum. It was certainly a great time to visit and I look forward to attending next year’s conference in St. Louis!
In a more recent update, my graduate cohort hosted our thesis exhibition at RIT’s William Harris Gallery in April, and after a successful thesis defense, I graduated with an MFA in Photography and Related Media. It was a two-year program that flew by quickly, but I am very thankful to have taken the time to work through aspects of my photographic practice with support from faculty and an amazing group of peers. I plan to re-format and post some writing samples that I did in seminar courses, much of it related to my interest and previous work with ABC No Rio and Allied Productions.
In May and June, I had my second solo exhibition at PeepSpace in Tarrytown, NY. My work was selected from an open call that was published on the New York Foundation for the Arts website, and I am grateful to have had my work selected for exhibition at this artist-run gallery. We had opening and closing receptions during the exhibition run, which allowed me to engage with Tarrytown’s community of artists and art workers, some of whom had connections to the photo community here in Rochester.
Also in May, I began a new position as curatorial assistant in the Department of Photography at the George Eastman Museum. This is an opportunity that I am particularly thrilled about, as the museum has a long and rich history of collecting and promoting photography, as well as a fascinating lineage of curatorial leadership in the field. I first visited the museum in 2014, returning many years as a patron and as a student, so I am excited to continue learning as I develop a curatorial practice and to contribute what I can along the way.
In September and October, I will be doing my first artist residency at Visual Studies Workshop. During my time at VSW, I plan to work on a book project that features an expanded collection of work from New Intimacies as well as photos and text that were created before and after that series. VSW has an exceptional collection of artist books in their library and bookstore, many of which have been published by VSW Press, so I am looking forward to researching these collections as I sort out elements of the bookmaking process. I will also be hosting a skillshare workshop during the residency period and there will be an open studio event, so please stop by to visit if you are in the area!
Lastly, I wanted to share about a few exciting exhibitions and events that I have seen in the past few months. In April, I had a chance to visit Images on which to build, 1970s to 1990s at the Leslie-Lohman Museum of Art, curated by Ariel Goldberg. This exhibition brought together significant photographs and documentation from an important span of queer life, highlighting key moments of community building and the development of visual cultures to support these connections. I was most interested in seeing a recorded presentation of The Dyke Show by JEB (Joan E. Biren), which I first learned about in my Histories and Aesthetics of Photography course with Ariel Evans. The slideshow presentation offers viewers insights into a long history of lesbian image-culture and iconography, sprinkled with plenty of humorous anecdotes throughout.
While in New York, I also attended the 2023 Photobook Fest at the International Center of Photography, as well as an exhibition of beautiful and meticulous paper-cut works by Chinese artist Xiyadie at The Drawing Center and a group exhibition curated by Isis Award for Visual AIDS at the Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts. There, I was introduced to the work of Jerome Caja, an artist who was active in the underground queer performance scene in San Francisco in the 1980s and 90s. Caja used nail polish to paint on household objects and thrift store items, utilizing materials that were plentiful or that were given to him by friends in the community.
The following week, I took a vacation to California and visited the Palm Springs Art Museum for the first time. I wanted to visit to see a series by Michael Childers titled Flaming Creatures. which is a collection of photographs of a Los Angeles Drag Ball in the 1970s. The museum was also exhibiting a commission of paintings by Tajh Rust, each depicting a quiet or contemplative scene with motifs of mirroring, reflection, or shadow-play. I was taken with these works and the artist’s use of domestic spaces, generations of family portraits, and the picture frames on the wall.
Once I returned to New York, I went Buffalo for pride weekend and attended the Stratigakos Symposium. The theme of the conference and panel discussion was Queer(ing) Space and it was hosted at Kingfish, a queer project space with connections to the University of Buffalo’s architecture program. Having recently completed my thesis work on queer cruising sites, I was interested in the discourse around queer space that was taking place in this field. The panelists each brought a unique set of ideas to the conversation, many of which included collaborations, research, and creative exercises that were done in conjunction with students at various universities and institutions.
All in all, it’s been a very generative and inspired year thus far. I appreciate you for having gotten this far into this newsletter and for your support of my creative work and research. Please send an email if you have questions or would like to say hi!
Kind regards,
L