Griffin Museum of Photography

Winchester

Jill Enfield | Glasshouse of New Americans

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The Griffin Museum is pleased to present on our Griffin Rotary Terrace Jill Enfield’s powerful installation, Glasshouse of New Americans.

“…this ever-evolving diversity challenges the idea of a single dominant vision of the American identity, encouraging Americans to embrace inclusion and pluralism.” – Ellis Island Museum.

Titled “The New Americans,” this physical display explores heritage, genealogy, and homeland.

Artist Jill Enfield remarks on her project – My personal connection to immigration, with my paternal relatives fleeing Frankfurt, Germany, in 1939, inspired a project honoring immigrants’ integral role in society and acknowledging the challenges they continue to face to this day. Combining 19th century wet collodion ambrotypes with digital scanning and 21st -century printing, I sought to merge traditional and digital photographic practices. The distressed exterior window frames forming the glasshouse were sourced from abandoned side roads, flea markets, and construction sights, symbolizing the precarious nature of immigration that still exists today.

The wet collodion process references the technique used to document immigrants passing through Ellis Island in the 1800’s. By blending historical and contemporary elements, I aimed to created portraits reflecting both the historic technique and the present-day reality of immigration.

Photography, reliant on the interplay of time and light, becomes a narrative journey during the prolonged exposures required by the wet collodion process. The resulting stillness allows the viewer to step into the photographer’s and the subjects’ shared experience, capturing the far-reaching heritage and stories encoded in each subject’s eyes. Once assembled, the glasshouse becomes an interactive experience. Visitors can walk around and through it, casting shadows that add a dynamic element to the portraits. The glasshouse serves as a metaphor for the diversity that makes up our country – each panel contributing to its strength. If you removed one panel, the house would fall.

The phrase “Those in glass houses should not throw stones” gains poignant meaning as viewers gaze into the eyes of the New Americans, realizing that we are all immigrants. This understanding of heritage and history is crucial for fostering a more empathetic and compassionate future.

Our Town 2025

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The Griffin is celebrating the beauty of Winchester in Summer of 2025.

As part of our summer public art project, Vision(ary), Our Town will be located on the grounds of the Winchester Town Common. We are excited to see the vision of the Winchester community including hobbyists using a phone camera as well as photographers both amateur and professional of any age taking us on a visual journey, documenting the people, places, and moments that define our town.

From the local businesses and street corners, along the Riverwalk and bike pathway every part of the town holds a story waiting to be told. Through candid portraits, scenic landscapes, and snapshots of everyday life, the Our Town project aims to create a vibrant tapestry of images that reflect the diverse spirit of our town.

The initiative not only celebrates the beauty of our surroundings but also fosters a deeper connection among neighbors. In our third year presenting this collection of images we are building a collective memory, preserving the unique character of our town for generations to come.

We invited the residents of Winchester to discover the extraordinary moments within the ordinary spaces we call home.

Thank you to all of our participating artists – Jenna Brown, Justin Cole, Hilda Wong Doo, David Feigenbaum, Trish Gannon, Joyce Maxwell, Georgia McGuire, Mario Moreira and Christina Rose

Combining landscapes, still-lifes, portraiture, and more, Our Town invites you to witness individual moments woven into a broader community narrative of Winchester.

Our Town is made possible by the generous support of our sponsors: The Griffin Exhibitions Committee, Griffin Directors Circle Patrons and The Winchester Cultural District. We are also grateful for the support of the En Ka Society, Winchester Savings Bank, Winchester Rotary and Winchester Cultural Council.

  • MCC-CD-logo-Winchester

  • Winchester Cultural Council Logo

    Winchester Cultural Council

  • winchester rotary

Photosynthesis XX

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Photosynthesis XX is a collaboration between Burlington High School and Winchester High School facilitated by the Griffin Museum of Photography.

Join us on April 3, 5:30 – 7:30pm for an Artist Reception to celebrate these talented students’ works and meet their instructors and supporters.

This 5-month program connects students with each other and with professional photographers, artists, and curators. Using photography as a visual language, students increase their vocabulary to communicate about themselves and the world around them. Interacting with fellow students from different programs, backgrounds, and schools, the students create a capsule of who they are in this moment, learning from each other to create a united exhibition showcasing all they have learned during the program.

Winchester High School

Isabella Bogovich | Mason Lieberman
Ainsley Porter | Maddie Shonkoff | Bowdie Simpson

  • © Bowden Simpson
    © Bowden Simpson
  • © Maddie Shonkof
    © Maddie Shonkof
  • © Mason Lieberman
    © Mason Lieberman
  • © Isabella Bogovich
    © Isabella Bogovich
  • © Ainsley Porter
    © Ainsley Porter

    • Burlington High School

    Sean Cox | Mackenzie Goldsmith | Taylor Papagno | Emanick Carrasquillo | Olivia Floyd | Maddie Spreadbury | Jillian Noke | Nora McDowell | Naya Ulysse | Grayson Reidy | Alessia Pedruzzi | Emersyn Kirchner

  • © Naya Ulysse
  • © Maddie Spreadbury
  • © Grayson Reidy
  • © Alessia Pedruzzi
  • © Taylor Papagno
  • © Jillian Noke
  • © Nora McDowell
  • © Emersyn Kirchner
  • © Mackenzie Goldsmith
  • © Olivia Floyd
  • © Sean Cox
  • © Carrasquillo Emanick

    • New Horizons: Korean Contemporary Photography

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    The New Horizons: Korean Contemporary Photography exhibition will introduce the creative and diverse works of established Korean photographers to American audiences.

    Curated by Joanne Junga Yang, this exhibition in our Main Gallery showcases the captivating works of seven contemporary Korean photographers: Ok Hyun Ahn, Seongyoun Koo, Anna Lim, Soosik Lim, Hyundoo Park, Jiyeon Sung and Sun Hi Zo, Their diverse portfolios delve into the intricate tapestry of human emotions, exploring themes of longing, loss, and the nuanced ways in which individuals navigate their cultural identities.

    Read more from Joanne Junga Yang‘s curatorial statement here.

    Korean photography has developed through a dynamic balance between documentation and artistic expression, serving as both a means of recording reality and a tool for creative interpretation. While traditional documentary photography has captured social and historical transformations, contemporary photographers explore new possibilities by expanding the boundaries of the medium. Through this evolution, Korean photography has developed a distinct visual language that reflects the ongoing changes in society and culture.

    <New Horizons: Korean Contemporary Photography> introduces seven photographers who reinterpret reality through their images, responding to the world around them and creating new narratives. This exhibition highlights how Korean contemporary photography engages with global artistic trends while maintaining its unique perspective. These artists, who have witnessed the transition from analog to digital photography, continue to experiment with the medium’s potential. Their works go beyond simple representation, using photography to question, redefine, and expand how we perceive the world.

    Ok Hyun Ahn

    Ok Hyun Ahn lives and works in Seoul. She earned her MFA in Photography, Video, and Related Media, at the School of Visual Arts in New York. She was awarded the Artist in the Marketplace (AIM) Fellowship at the Bronx Museum, New York (2012), and has had residencies in the International Studio & Curatorial Program (ISCP), New York (2010), and the Ssamzie Studio Program, Seoul (2007). Her numerous solo exhibitions include Dictee x Love Poem, Daejeon Museum of Art (2023), Love, Tears, Seduction, Lydmar Hotel, Stockholm (2015), and Homo Sentimentalis, SHOW ROOM, NYC (2013). Her work was presented at 12th Gwangju Biennale, 2018 and others. Her work has been collected by the Seoul Museum of Art, the Museum of Contemporary Art Busan, the Daejeon Museum of Art, and the Photographic Center Northwest, Seattle.

    Working primarily in photography and video, she not only explores the complex aspects of human emotions but also exposes the banal layers underneath consciousness to be absurd. 

    Jiyeon Sung

    Jiyeon Sung is a contemporary photographer known for her staged photography, which reinterprets everyday scenes in a minimalist way using mise-en-scène elements inspired by theater sets. By placing simple yet symbolic objects and figures, her work visualizes the inner world of modern individuals and explores existential questions. The moments she captures are not frozen in death but suspended in continuous time.

    After studying French literature in Korea, she earned a Master’s degree in Photography and Contemporary Art from the University of Paris VIII. In 2006, she received the Promising Artist Award from the Korean Cultural Center in France, and in 2016, she was awarded the 14th Daum Artist Award by the Parkgeonhi Foundation in Korea. Her works are included in the collections of the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art – Art Bank, Seoul Museum of Art, Busan Museum of Art, Hanmi Museum of Photography, GoEun Museum of Photography, Société Générale Bank in France, and FRAC Haute-Normandie, among others.

    Seongyoun Koo

    Seongyoun Koo is a South Korean photographer who challenges conventional perceptions of objects through her still-life photography. By placing unexpected materials in unconventional settings or creating compositions that mimic natural forms, she playfully subverts the inherent meanings and values we attach to everyday things. Her major series include Butterflies (2000), Sand (2004), Flower Pots (2005), Popcorn (2007), Candy (2009–), and Sugar (2015–).

    Her work explores how simple contextual shifts can radically alter an object’s meaning. In her Flowers and Butterflies series, she demonstrates how a beautiful butterfly, when placed on a bowl of rice instead of a flower, suddenly becomes an inedible insect. This playful yet critical approach continues in Flower Pots, where she stages scenes of ornamental plants invading human spaces, offering a satirical commentary on humanity’s tendency to view nature as something to control and conquer. Koo later transitioned to constructing artificial landscapes by hand, blurring the line between reality and representation. In Popcorn, she uses popped kernels to recreate delicate plum blossoms, emphasizing their fleeting beauty. In Candy, she meticulously crafts peony flowers—symbols of wishes and prosperity—out of colorful sweets, merging themes of desire and impermanence. In Sugar, she molds decorative objects from sugar, allowing them to melt over time, reflecting on the ephemerality of existence and the fragility of value. Her work often plays with material illusion, where ephemeral substances—whether sugar, candy, or popcorn—are transformed into something visually substantial yet fundamentally transient. The melting sugar sculptures, in particular, resonate as a poetic meditation on time, memory, and the impermanence of human constructs.

    Seongyoun Koo lives and works in Seoul, South Korea. She holds a B.A. in Indian Philosophy from Dongguk University (1994) and a B.F.A. in Photography from Seoul Institute of the Arts (1997).

    Anna Lim

    Anna Lim was born and live in Seoul. She graduated MA from California State University, Fullerton in 1996 and received PhD in Art Photography from from Hongik University in Korea in 2019.

    She has won the award the 11th ILWOO Photography Award, Seoul (2020), the Arles Photo Portfolio Review Award (2019), Korean Artist Project Artists (2017), SOORIM Photography Cultural Award (2014), Raising Female Artist Award (2013), Sovereign Art Foundation Asia 30 Artists (2012), Public Art 4070 Project Artist of the Year (2012), New York Gallery Korea Young Artist of the Year (1999). Furthermore, she has held 20 individual exhibitions and more than 50 group exhibitions at home and abroad and has been working steadily so far. In the recent series of works, Anxiety; Weight transferred to images (2022), Anxiety ON/OFF (2020), Anxiety rehearsal (2018), Frozen Hero (2017), Reconstruction of Climax (2011), she visualizes a meta-fictional narrative self-reflective perspective on mass media that distributes images of war weapons and other people’s pain as spectacles, and the viewer who consumes them.

    She is currently a professor in the Department of Photography and Media at Sangmyung University in Korea.

    Soosik Lim

    Soosik Lim graduated from Chung-ang University’s Department of Photography and the graduate school of the same university. He expresses various objects that symbolize universal desire using photography through series of works such as Chaekgado (which combined photos of bookshelves with the way in which to create Korean traditional paintings), Picturenary, Mountain, and Room.K. Lim has participated in over 100 group exhibitions and 20 solo exhibitions in many countries, including the U.K., Spain, and Brazil. His works are housed at several museums, such as the Art Bank at Korea’s National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art and Germany’s Reiner Kunze Museum.


    Hyundoo Park

    Hyundoo Park studied photography at Chung-Ang University’s College of Arts in the early 2000s and later earned an M.F.A. in Photography and Related Media from the School of Visual Arts in New York. Since then, he has been working on his ongoing series, Goodbye Stranger.

    He has received the 8th Park Geon-hi Foundation Next Artist Award and the 1st Surim Cultural Foundation Surim Photography Award. He was also selected for major artist residencies, including the National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art (MMCA) Goyang Residency, the Seoul Museum of Art (SeMA) Nanji Residency, and the SeMA Exhibition Support Program. Through his work, Park explores the theme of existential alienation in modern society from various perspectives.

    In addition to his artistic practice, he has taught photography at Korea National University of Arts, Chung-Ang University, and Hongik University, educating both university students and the general public.

    Sun Hi Zo

    Sun Hi Zo (b. 1971) explores loss, memory, and transformation through photography.

    Her works, including Daisy; Cosmos Mea (2022) and Frozen Gaze (2020~), examine the boundaries of time, impermanence, and presence. Her Planet (2024~) series investigates material and temporal continuity, presenting decay as a continuous cycle of dissolution and renewal. Recently, she has been working on a desert-based project exploring invisibility and traces. Based in Seoul, she works globally and studied at Yonsei and Hongik University.

    She is currently a professor at Kyungil University.

    This exhibition is made possible by the generous financial support of the Griffin Directors Circle, Griffin Exhibition Committee and Advisory Council. Additional support from the Consulate General of the Republic of Korea and the Korean Cultural Society of Boston.

    Timothy Hyunsoo Lee | Imprints

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    My slanted eyes betray my Western tongue, and in this yellow body of mine I deeply understood the meaning of longing and belonging. My pathway into art stems from the necessity to forge a pathway towards representation – of myself, my identity, but also to translate personal experiences into a conversation that resonates universally. I am interested in the semiotics of childhood artefacts and language, and the significance of this mean-making within abstraction. The mugwort – a central image of my current works – become both an image and a mark; at once referencing one of the first familiar things I encountered as a new transplant to New York City, but also acknowledging how this herb – while culturally significant in Korea for its resilience – exists for those same reasons as an invasive species in the United States. I am interested in image capturing, processing, and transferring, and how the lexicon of photosensitive processes mimics those of immigration. I think a lot about the notion of exposure, which I’ve defined as assimilation, and how exposure works within cyanotype processes to capture time-based documentation of whitening, erasure, and the invisibility that comes with the transience of constant migration.

    My practice, and the breadth of my interests, tells a fragmented story constantly reassembling itself – a story of how a boy grew into his body and into his home. A story about migrating, and the rituals and labors of that journey. A story about feeling the politicized, fetishized, and abstracted body so deeply long before learning the vocabulary to describe it. A story about dreaming and finally waking up. 

    About Imprints

    An imprint is a mark formed by pressing something against another; it is a residue of an interaction past, and serves as a reminder for the future. The works presented in this collection of works are imprints of experiments, exercises, and works that serve as formative reminders and cues to Timothy Hyunsoo Lee’s large-scale practices in image capturing, transferring, preservation and deterioration. His works in image transfer techniques highlights a rebellion to, and rejection of, the manic archival practices of photography in the era of smartphones and the Cloud, and how the deterioration of the image through each subsequent transfer process mirrors the natural deterioration of memories. He is particularly interested in the significance of meaning-making when referential points in representation get increasingly obscure, and how it affects our relationship to the original image, and original memory. Within his works in cyanotype printing – an attempt that documenting the ritual of performance, iterations, and endurance that defines Timothy’s practice in the visual arts, he is particularly interested in how the lexicon of this photosensitive process mimics those of immigration, and thinking about the terminology of exposure as assimilation. His abstractions in cyanotype utilizes exposure lengths to capture time-based documentation of whitening, erasing, and ultimately the invisibility that comes with the transience of constant migration – something that he has deeply felt as a child immigrant in the United States. 

    About Timothy Hyunsoo Lee –

    Timothy Hyunsoo Lee is an interdisciplinary artist whose practice explores the relationship between rituals of (in)visibility, community and the abstracted, queer body. Born in Seoul, South Korea and raised in New York City, he received his B.A. in Neuroscience, Biology and Studio Art from Wesleyan University (Middletown, CT) and his MFA in computational arts from Goldsmiths, University of London (UK). Lee’s background in laboratory research and emerging technologies ushers in an empirical approach to investigating the materiality and precision in his practice, his interests in legacies of craft, representation, and labor, that is complemented with the existential urgency of growing up between cultures. Timothy’s works have been exhibited at venues such as the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery, the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, the Orlando Museum of Art, the Studio Museum, The Wallach Art Gallery of Columbia University, The YoungArts Foundation Gallery, Real Jardín Botánico de Madrid, and La Casa Encendida, with a public project with the MTA Arts & Design (New York). He is currently based between Boston and NYC and lectures at the School of the Museum of Fine Arts at Tufts University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology W20 Art Studios. 

    All images Courtesy of the artist and Sabrina Amrani Gallery (Madrid, Spain)

    Nuclear Family

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    What makes a family? How do we define community? These fundamental questions are explored in the exhibition Nuclear Family, which re-imagines the concept of family, expanding our vision beyond traditional norms through the lens of LGBTQIA+ artists.

    Traditional family values. The universal phrase for how we perceive and accept families in public. We are reminded of the standard visual narrative of a family as two heterosexual parents and their children. Family dynamics are complicated, not all of us fit into this vision of perceived perfection. In expanding the idea of family, we see these photographers present honest and authentic portrayals of themselves, their families and the broader community, challenging viewers to confront their own biases and assumptions through fresh eyes. 

    Featuring a diverse range of photographic and video works, the exhibition presents a compelling exploration of diverse family structures. Jess Dugan‘s A Letter to My Daughter is a poignant video essay that delves into the joys and challenges of parenthood. Mengwen Cao‘s Liminal Space celebrates the everyday beauty, intimacy, and resilience of queer and trans people of color, with a particular focus on Asian queer identities. Yorgos Efthymiadis‘ Lighthouse Keepers offers a series of intimate portraits of friends in their own spaces, providing a glimpse into the artist’s personal connections and his shared community. Laurence Philomene‘s vibrant and colorful images serve as a visual diary reflecting their environment and their own trans and non-binary identity. Anne Vetter‘s Love is not the Last Room explores themes of gender, attachment, and family through intimate portraits of themselves and their partner. Matthew Leifheit‘s Queer Archives delves into LGBTQIA+ history through objects and archives that remind the community of its origins and those who came before.

    These artists utilize photography and video not only to document their lives but also to challenge societal norms and celebrate the diversity of love and family structures. By reclaiming the genre of portraiture, often used to uphold traditional ideals, they create powerful and moving works that resonate with viewers on a deeply personal level.

    Nuclear Family was conceived and created by curator and artist Katalina Simon, in collaboration with Crista Dix, Executive Director of the Griffin Museum, and exhibition designer Yana Nosenko.

    More about the artists of Nuclear Family –

    Mengwen Cao | Liminal Space

    “Liminal Space” is a visual meditation on the everyday beauty, intimacy, and resilience of queer and trans people of color, with a focus on Asian queer identities. Through a tender gaze, these images capture moments of becoming and summon futures rooted in joy, connection, and care.

    The project began as a way to connect with my community and evolved into an exploration of belonging, healing, and self-love. Each portrait embodies a collaborative process, inviting people to imagine themselves in a way that feels safe, authentic, and expansive. These moments of introspection become portals: spaces where individual transformation and collective belonging can thrive.

    In a world that often amplifies extremes, “Liminal Space” aims to normalize queer existence beyond spectacle or struggle. By sharing these tender moments, I hope to offer a counter-narrative—one that embraces the multiplicity of our identities while celebrating the beauty of the in-between.

    About Mengwen Cao

    MENGWEN CAO (they/them) is an artist, educator and somatic coach creating multimedia portals for personal and collective transformation. Born and raised in Hangzhou, China, they are currently nomadic with roots in New York and Chiang Mai. Weaving their embodied experience as a Chinese diasporic queer into their spiritual and creative practices, they use care and tenderness to explore in-between spaces. They see photography as a vehicle for healing and a tool to visualize the future.

    Jess T. Dugan | Letter to my Daughter

    Letter to My Daughter is an autobiographical video directed to my five-year-old daughter, Elinor, that centers around my experience with parenthood throughout the first five years of her life. The audio soundtrack is my voice reading a letter to Elinor, and the images are from my personal archive and include snapshots, ultrasound images, and photographs from Family Pictures.The letter is highly personal and addresses a variety of topics, including my expectations around parenthood, the long and circuitous journey of trying to have a child with both known and anonymous sperm donors, the experiences of miscarriage and loss, and my adjustment to parenthood as a queer and nonbinary person. Perhaps most importantly, it tries to put into words the intensity of love between a parent and child as well as the significant personal growth parenthood both inspires and requires.Letter to My Daughter is part of my larger exploration of family. It is in dialogue with my 2017 video,Letter to My Father, which explores my estranged relationship with my father, as well as my long-term series of photographs Family Pictures(2012-present),which focuses on the intimacy of familial relationships, aging, and the passage of time through an extended look at three generations of my family.

    About Jess T. Dugan

    Jess T. Dugan (b. 1986, Biloxi, MS) is an artist and writer whose work explores the complexities of personhood, relationships, desire, love, and family. While their practice is centered around photography, it also includes writing, video, sound, drawing, and installation. Their work is informed by their own life experiences, including their identity as a queer and nonbinary person, and reflects a deep belief in the importance of representation and the transformative power of storytelling.  

    Their work is regularly exhibited internationally and is in the permanent collections of over 60 museums. Their monographs include Look at me like you love me (MACK, 2022), To Survive on This Shore: Photographs and Interviews with Transgender and Gender Nonconforming Older Adults (Kehrer Verlag, 2018) and Every Breath We Drew (Daylight Books, 2015). They are the recipient of a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, an ICP Infinity Award, and were selected by the Obama White House as an LGBT Artist Champion of Change. 

    They currently live and work in St. Louis, MO.

    Yorgos Efthymiadis | The Lighthouse Keepers

    Whenever I travel back to my country, it feels like I come across a shoebox in the back of my childhood bedroom closet, full of memorabilia I didn’t know were there. As soon as I open the box, an inner whisper says “I will remind you of everything.”

    There is an instant rush of fond memories of the house I grew up in by the sea and of the maze-like city I moved to when I got older. But mostly, of family and friends: the people that I care for and who have always been there for me since the beginning. The ones I take for granted.

    Growing up, so many of us were queer in our seaside town we joked “it must be in the water.” Some have left, many have stayed. Like everyone else, from the proud “mother” of the village who helped most of us come out, to the sentimental ones that are still hanging onto a past that is no longer there, we are struggling in our own way. Loneliness, isolation, decline. Secrets and regrets. But each one a lighthouse keeper. Strong and resilient, fragile and tender, always there to help, guiding each other through life, and reminding me of where I belong.

    About Yorgos Efthymiadis

    Yorgos Efthymiadis is an artist/curator from Greece who resides in Somerville, MA. A board member of Somerville Arts Council and founder of The Curated Fridge, an independent gallery that celebrates fine art photography, Efthymiadis is a recipient of the 2025 James and Audrey Foster Prize, an awardee of the Artist’s Resource Trust A.R.T. Grant in 2024, a finalist for the 2017 Massachusetts Cultural Council Fellowship, and a recipient of the St. Botolph Club Foundation 2017 Emerging Artist Award. This project has been supported by a grant from the Artist’s Resource Trust.

    Matthew Leifheit | Queer Archives

    Since 2021 Matthew Leifheit has traveled the country visiting and photographing in queer archives. Leifheit describes: “During the 1970s and 80s, independent archives were established by LGBTQ Americans to collect materials that major institutions would not. These materials—pictures, letters, T shirts, protest signs, ephemera, and the like—document queer culture and identity in the 20th century, in relation to the rise of the US gay rights movement. More importantly, they contain the evidence of many peoples’ lives who would otherwise be lost to history, for reasons ranging from homophobia to racial prejudice, sexism and AIDS.”

    Leifheit’s Queer Archive asks us to consider what is worth keeping, how histories are made and told, who gets to hold them, and who is able to seek out and find them.
    These photographs dramatize the limits of immortality as we attempt to access it through media.

    Text by Rachel Stern, Curator, MassArt Museum exhibition, 2024

    About Matthew Leifheit

    Matthew Leifheit is an American photographer, magazine editor, and professor based in Brooklyn, New York. A graduate of Rhode Island School of Design and the Yale School of Art, Leifheit is Editor-in-Chief of MATTE Magazine, the journal of emerging photography he has published since 2010. Leifheit’s photographs have appeared in publications such as The New York Times, The New Yorker, Aperture, TIME, and Artforum, and have been exhibited internationally. His work has been supported by residencies at the Corporation of Yaddo and The Watermill Center, receiving grants from the New York State Cultural Council and the Fund for Lesbian and Gay Studies at Yale, where he was awarded the Richard Benson Prize in 2017. He is currently full-time faculty at Massachusetts College of Art and Design in Boston.

    Laurence Philomene |

    In recent years, I have challenged myself to take daily pictures to document my evolving sense of self as a non-binary person undertaking hormonal replacement therapy. The resulting photos look at transition beyond the physical, into the intimate and domestic aspects of life viewers are rarely granted access to. Individually, each photo tells the story of a small moment, but when juxtaposed with one another, context is gained and a new, more powerful narrative is created : one of creating a home both within my environment and my body.

    Growing up, the only access I had to queer history was through photography books I borrowed at the library. In lieu of institutional recognition, a lot of our history as marginalized folks is passed down through self-documentation as a means of reclaiming our narrative, which is something that’s always been fascinating to me. I think of the freedom to create our own story as an integral part of embodying queerness.

    About Laurence Philomene

    Laurence Philomene is a non-binary artist from Montreal (b.1993) who creates colourful photographs informed by their lived experiences as a chronically ill transgender person. Their practice celebrates trans existence, and studies identity as a space in constant flux via highly-saturated, cinematic, and vulnerable images.

    Laurence’s first monograph Puberty – in which the artist self-documents two years of their life as they undergo hormonal replacement therapy – was published in 2022 by Yoffy Press.

    Anne Vetter | love is not the last room

    Vetter’s series “Love is Not the Last Room” is made in collaboration with the artist’s family—their parents, their brothers, and their partner. It is an examination of play and leisure, tension and freedom. Through photographs, Vetter processes how they learned to relate in their most intimate connections, and how they relate now. This project explores queer familial relationships, and uses Vetter’s own gender fluidity as a lens to examine the gendered experiences of their family members.

    About Anne Vetter

    Anne Vetter (b. 1994) lives and works in California and Massachusetts. They are currently a MFA candidate at UCLA (2026). They are a Jewish-American artist. Their work is focused on play, permission, desire and performance. 

    We are pleased to partner with Digital Silver Imaging to print the images for the exhibition.

    Matthew Finley | An Impossibly Normal Life

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    Imagine a world where it doesn’t matter who you love, just that you love. 

    An Impossibly Normal Life is an artifact from another world, a more loving, inclusive one where who you love is of little societal importance. This fictional story, centered on my imagined uncle’s idealized life, is created from collected vintage snapshots from around the world. 

    Four years ago, my mother offhandedly mentioned that I had an uncle who may have been gay, but he died not long after I was born. Hearing this revelation for the first time, nearly thirty years after I had struggled to come out to my disapproving family, sent my mind spinning. The thought of a family member so close to me going through some of the same things I did inspired me to create this story. 

    Instead of returning to the hiding or shame of most pre-1970’s queer stories, a reality of how our world was (and in some cases, still is), I have created an alternate history where fluidity in gender and sexuality is the societal norm. Re-contexualizing found photographs and creating a new narrative, my Uncle Ken’s life becomes full of acceptance, friends and love, and shows anyone struggling with identity today the joy of what could have been and can still be.

    About Matthew Finley

    Based in Los Angeles, Matthew Finley’s work has shown in solo and group shows in galleries across the U.S. He has pieces in the collections of the Museum of Contemporary Photography, Columbia College Chicago, MOAH, Lancaster, and the Center for Fine Art Photography. His current project An Impossibly Normal Life recently received Center Santa Fe’s 2024 Personal Award as well as the Center for Photographic Art’s 2024 LGBTQ+ Artist Grant.

    To learn more, please visit Matthew’s website at: http://mfinleyphoto.com/

    Kevin Bennett Moore | Meditations in an Emergency

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    Meditations in an Emergency

    Influenced by my own queer experience and ideals of mid-century American culture, my work investigates a familiar environment that alludes to something more enigmatic. Creating vignettes of this space and time allows for the images to exist in reality or remain fictitious. 

    Initially making work about control of the environment, I am able to create a safe space for the narrative to unfold; purposely diverting from what we may consider conventional. The characters become distant protagonists as the work allows the viewer to respond as a voyeur.

    “Meditations in an Emergency” explores quiet amongst chaos. By focusing on themes of disaster and tragedy I am able to address the human condition; attempting to thrive in times of turmoil.

    About Kevin Bennett Moore

    Kevin Bennett Moore (b. 1996) is an artist living and working in Boston. His self-portrait based projects largely discuss queerness by utilizing the past to talk about current politics. Moore is influenced greatly by films of the 1950s & 60s, gender performativity, and ideals of mid-century American culture. He graduated from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design with a degree in photography (BFA ’20)

    The Collector’s Eye | Frazier King

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    The Griffin Museum is excited to showcase the collection of artist and collector, Frazier King. Known to emerging, mid career and established artists of the medium, Frazier has spent a lifetime supporting, collecting and collaborating with photographers celebrating the craft and artistry of photography.

    Paul Rosenblum – Snowscape
    Flora Merillion – No 117-L’ailleurs de l’autreIles de Sado, Japon
    Peter Brown – Plowed Field

    The collection of Frazier King is a reflection of his interactions with his fellow contemporary photographers over the last 20 years, King has collected black and white as well as color prints focusing on the constructed photograph. This collection provides a unique record of the various ways of constructing an image, and the evolution of this genre over the last decades.  The collection was originally presented by FotoFest in 2012 in an exhibition entitled The Collector’s Eye II.  Subsequently, King produced a book in conjunction with FotoFest entitled The Collector’s Eye—A Photographer’s View of His Contemporaries.

    King explains that he uses an intuitive process in developing both his collection and his photographic practice.  The collection springs from his personal exchanges with various photographers in the context of FotoFest Meeting Place, as well as in his role as an active member of the board of the Houston Center for Photography and his own photographic practice.  King, who worked as an energy lawyer in Houston, created several projects using constructed images and his photography has been shown worldwide and is included in a number of important museum collections.  

    Peter Brown – Cake Palace
    Suzette Bross – Blue Sky
    Susan Dunkerley Maguire – Lily

    The collection is grouped according to the methods of construction and, as a collector, gives his interpretation of each one of them. His collection includes prints by Roberto Fernández Ibáñez, Jerry Uelsmann, Diane Ducruet and others, who constructed their photographs in the printing process. The largest portion of the constructed photographs in King’s collection consists of prints resulting from a construction in front of the camera – Elaine Duigenan, Pavel Baňka, John Chervinsky, and Susan Dunkerley Maguire are just a few, who bring inanimate objects to life, play with scale, use scanners rather than a camera and use unusual materials to physically construct a representation of a particular object or series of objects.

    About Frazier King

    Frazier King is a photographer, collector and curator, living and working in Houston, TX.  His photography work focuses on constructed still life and some bodies are produced using film and gelatin silver prints while others are produced using digital capture and archival pigment prints.  “The Seven Deadly Sins” series is his most recent work, produced in 2022.  Over the last 25 years he has exhibited in numerous solo and group shows in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Brazil, France, and Belgium.  His work is included in the collections of many individuals and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; Harry Ransom Center, Austin, TX; George Eastman House, Rochester, NY; Bibliothèque nationale de France, Paris, France; and Museu de Arte Moderna, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.  He has been a collector since the 1990s.  His collection was shown by FotoFest in 2012 in “The Collector’s Eye II” exhibition.  Subsequently, he produced in conjunction with FotoFest and Schilt Publishing a book entitled “The Collector’s Eye—A Photographer’s View of His Contemporaries,” showing his collection and featuring essays by Wendy Watriss, co-founder of FotoFest, Madeline Yale Preston, former Executive Director of the Houston Center of Photography and now independent curator, and himself, addressing the nature of the collection and its acquisition.  The book is entitled “The Collector’s Eye—A Photographer’s View of His Contemporaries.”  During his 15 years serving as a member of the board of directors of HCP, he curated or co-curated exhibitions and participated as a reviewer in photography portfolio review events around the world.  

    Jo Sandman | A Life in Art

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    The Griffin is thrilled to showcase the work of creative artist Jo Sandman. The museum is proud to hold in its collection objects that span the breadth and depth of Sandman’s creativity. Her exploration of craft, utilizing photography as a base layer expands our vision of humanity, our way of seeing. In the 1990s, Sandman turned her attention to photography, grounding her images in the human figure, mortality, and the tensions between the material and the spiritual. Sandman’s photographic work is characteristically experimental—she employs both antique 19th-century photographic processes alongside contemporary medical and digital imaging techniques to create her beautiful, poetic, and disquieting images.

    About Jo Sandman –

    Jo Sandman was not only a witness to the historically important experimentation that shaped mid to late 20th century art, but also an active participant . A student of both Hans Hofmann and Robert Motherwell, she was in residence at Black Mountain College with Robert Rauschenberg and Cy Twombly and later worked for Walter Gropius. Trained as a painter, she went on to create innovative drawings, photography, experimental sculpture and installation works, which were exhibited widely and are now in the permanent collections of numerous museums, including the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, the de Young Fine Arts Museum in San Francisco, and many others. In addition to numerous artist residencies and teaching fellowships, she taught at Wellesley College and the Massachusetts College of Art and Design. Significant awards include fellowships from the Massachusetts Arts Council and the Bunting Institute at Harvard, as well as grants from the NEA and the Rockefeller Foundation. Over the course of a long career, she exhibited widely and in 2022 was featured in a career retrospective Jo Sandman: Traces at the Black Mountain College Museum in Asheville, NC and the exhibition Helen Frankenthaler and Jo Sandman/Without Limits at the Bowdoin College Museum of Art in Brunswick, ME.

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