Griffin Museum of Photography

Griffin Atelier Gallery

The Mysterious World of the Camera Obscura, Marian Roth

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Marian Roth has been making images for the past 35 years in the natural world of her village in Provincetown. Most recently the work she produces is made exclusively inside the cameras she has made and inhabits. Instead of photographing onto paper negatives from the camera obscura, she photographs the actual projected image, capturing light and time.

Roth’s series, The Mysterious World of the Camera Obscura, is featured in the Atelier Gallery at the Griffin Museum of Photography on September 8th through October 2, 2016. Also starting on September 8th, will be the installation of Roth’s camera obscura in the Griffin gallery. The installation will be up throughout the exhibition. The public is invited to observe the installation on September 8th beginning at noon. An opening reception will be held at the Griffin Museum on Thursday, September 15, 2016 from 5pm to 6:30pm. Marian Roth will give a talk on September 15, 2016 from 6:30 to 8pm. An RSVP is required. All of the events listed above are part of the Somerville Toy Camera Festival.

“As a visual artist obsessed with time and light, working inside a camera obscura is a magical experience for me: sitting in the darkness, letting light in through apertures I have cut out of tarpaper, arranging and re-arranging focal planes, waiting until something mysterious happens.” Says Roth. “ And if I can’t have my darkroom anymore, the camera obscura, with its tiny slits of light, is a wonder-filled cave to explore,” she said.

Marian Roth is a self-taught photographer and visual artist who has been working with the camera obscura imagery for the past three decades.  She has received a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Mass Cultural Council Fellowship, and this past year has been working with a fellowship from the Pollock Krasner Foundation. Marian has also received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Provincetown Art Association and Museum.

STILL LIVES PHOTOGRAPHS BY ELIOT DUDIK

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In completing this project, Eliot Dudik says he has, “…since learned that the motivations compelling [Civil War] re-enactors are incalculably complex, but generally address themselves to the preservation of history and appropriate honor for the fallen.”

Dudik’s series, Still Lives, is featured in the Atelier Gallery at the Griffin Museum of Photography July 14th through August 28th, 2016. An opening reception will take place on July 14th, 2016 from 7-8:30pm. Eliot Dudik will lead a workshop and gallery talk for members at a later date. The talk and reception are free and open to the public.

“My deeper curiosity and exploration began after hearing a re-enactor say
I don’t die anymore,” states Dudik. “…the idea of controlling one’s death, choosing when and where to perform and re-perform one’s demise, says something powerful about our relation to historical representation—about our need for it, and about its conditions and limitations.”
“These portraits provide a sense of the diversity of actors existing in this community, many of whom devote their lives to this performance, and strive to immortalize them in a fabricated state of tranquility as they hover above the ground they fight for.”

Eliot Dudik is a photographic artist, educator, and bookmaker exploring the connection between culture, memory, landscape, history, and politics. In 2012, Dudik was named one of PDN’s 30 New and Emerging Photographers to Watch and one of Oxford American Magazine’s 100 New Superstars of Southern Art. He was awarded the PhotoNOLA Review Prize in 2014 for his Broken Land and Still Lives portfolio, resulting in a book publication and solo exhibition. Broken Land was most recently published as a feature in the July/August 2015 issue of Smithsonian Magazine. FLASH FORWARD 2015 chose the series for publication and exhibition in Toronto and Boston.

His photographs have been installed in group and solo exhibitions across
the United States and Canada. Eliot taught photography at the University of South Carolina from 2011 to 2014 before founding the photography program within the Department of Art and Art History at the College of William & Mary where he is currently teaching and directing the Andrews Gallery at the college.

Molly Lamb: Ghost Stepping

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Molly Lamb says that over the years she has inherited most of her family’s belongings and that packing and unpacking them has become an internal dialogue.

Lamb’s series, Ghost Stepping, is featured in the Atelier Gallery at the Griffin Museum of Photography June 16th through July 10th, 2016. An opening reception will take place on June 16th, 2015 from 7-8:30pm. Molly Lamb will lead a gallery talk for members at 6:15 on June 16, 2016. The talk and reception are free and open to the public.

“The belongings [my family] left behind, elusive memories, and contradictory family stories form the precarious bedrock upon which my present reality rests,” states Lamb.
“The photographs [of Ghost Stepping] are a meditation on the fragments and layers that shape my personal landscape, its erosion, and its transformation. “

Molly Lamb is a fine art photographer and educator based in Massachusetts. She She holds an MFA from Massachusetts College of Art and Design and a BA in American Studies from the University of Massachusetts, Boston. Her work has been exhibited nationally. In 2015, she was named one of Photo District News’ 30 New and Emerging Photographers to Watch as well as one of LensCulture’s 50 Emerging Talents. She was also awarded an Artist Fellowship grant from the Massachusetts Cultural Council, she was a Critical Mass finalist, and she was a finalist for the New Orleans Photo Alliance’s Clarence John Laughlin Award. She is represented by Rick Wester Fine Art, New York.

The Human Landscape: Photographs by Karin Rosenthal

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Karin Rosenthal has dedicated her photographic career to exploring human experience via nudes in the landscape. Work from three different periods that expand the genre in disparate ways, will be on display.

The Griffin Gallery will showcase color images from her “Tide Pool” Series. Her more recent “Inheriting Loss” images, exploring family history and life’s fragility, will be featured in the Atelier Gallery accompanied by some of her earlier “Nudes in Water”.

Program Events
May 22 at 3PM Artists’ Dialogue – The Nude: From Object to Subject (Register Here)
Part 1: Teaching the Nude
Part 2: Collaborations
Event Description: Arguably the most controversial genre in photography, the Nude is loaded with cultural stereotypes and degrading projections. It also has tremendous potential for wide-ranging, meaningful expression. Karin will discuss her approach to teaching the Nude, followed by workshop students who will dialogue with the model about some of their best collaborations. Joining Karin in conversations about various images in the exhibition will be Jim Baab, Jim Banta, Pippi Ellison, Moti Hodis, Doug Johnson, Ron St. Jean and Tony Schwartz.

June 7 at 7PM Artist Talk -Journeying Within the Human Landscape with Karin Rosenthal

Karin Rosenthal has photographed nudes in the landscape since 1975, finding resonances between body and nature first in traditional photography and, more recently, in digital photography. In this talk, she draws from a variety of series to convey the evolution and range of her motivations and explorations. Using the alchemy of light, water, and the human figure, Rosenthal creates, with one click of the shutter, abstractions and illusions that challenge us to see beyond the predictable.

The Flash Forward Festival

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The Flash Forward Festival Boston is pleased to be hosting its fourth annual undergraduate exhibition at the Griffin Museum of Photography. The exhibition opens in the Atelier Gallery and Griffin Gallery of the Griffin Museum from April 7 through May 1, 2016. A reception will be held at the Griffin Museum on May 1 from 4 PM until 7 PM.

This cross section of talent represent some of the best college Juniors and Seniors enrolled in a college photography program in any of the New England States: Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, or Vermont, during the 2015–2016 academic year. All formats and categories of photography were accepted to highlight the vast talents of these future photography professionals and artists.

The jurors for the exhibition were Greer Muldowney and Camilo Ramirez. Greer Muldowney serves as an active member of the Board for the Griffin Museum of Photography, and currently teaches at Boston College, Boston University and Lesley University College of Art and Design. Camilo Ramirez currently lives and works in Boston, MA where he serves as SPE Northeast Regional Vice-Chair and Assistant Professor of Photography at Emerson College.

Featured Students

  • Rafaela Acero, Lesley University College of Art and Design (LUCAD)
  • Oliva Becchio, Lesley University College of Art and Design (LUCAD)
  • Marissa Ciampi, Massachusetts College of Art and Design (MassArt)
  • Melissa, D’Acunto, New Hampshire Institute of Art (NHIA)
  • Jenna DeLuca, New Hampshire Institute of Art (NHIA)
  • Emma Fishman, Emerson College
  • Kaitlyn Fitzgerald, Boston College
  • Sophie Gibbings, Lesley University College of Art and Design (LUCAD)
  • Meaghan Hardy-Lavoie, Clark University
  • Marissa Iamartino, Massachusetts College of Art and Design (MassArt)
  • Candice Jackson, Massachusetts College of Art and Design (MassArt)
  • Regan Kenny, University of Southern Maine
  • Rachel Martin, New England School of Photography (NESOP)
  • Joshua Mathews, Massachusetts College of Art and Design (MassArt)
  • Sun Park, Emerson College
  • Kolin Perry, Lesley University College of Art and Design (LUCAD)
  • Ben Rapkin, New England School of Photography (NESOP)
  • Hannah Richman, Lesley University College of Art and Design (LUCAD)
  • Kathryn Riley, Boston College
  • Jillian Ryan, University of New Hampshire (UNH)
  • Sloane Volpe, Lesley University College of Art and Design (LUCAD)
  • Evan Walsh, Emerson College
  • Rebecca Warner, University of Massachusetts Dartmouth
  • Lee Wormald, Lesley University College of Art and Design (LUCAD)
  • Yiran Zheng, Rhode Island School of Design
  • Aaron Zwain, Community College of Rhode Island (CCRI)

Photography Atelier 23

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The Photography Atelier 23 will present an exhibit of student and faculty artwork from March 10th to April 3rd, 2016. The Atelier is a course for intermediate and advanced photographers offered by the Griffin Museum of Photography. You are invited to come view the photographs at the Griffin Museum of Photography, 67 Shore Road, Winchester, Massachusetts 01890. On Thursday, March 10th, the public is invited to attend the artists’ reception from 6:30 to 8:00 p.m.

Work by Atelier 23 members includes:
Andy Schirmer: Vanishing Points, explores how the evolution of pattern recognition in humans has produced both survival skills and aesthetics;
Amy Rindskopf: Dreamed Botany, unexpected views from the greenhouse;
Claudia Gustafson: Indelible Memories, is about the internal landscapes of the human experience. The themes for this series come from the artist’s time growing up in Lima, Peru;
Darrell Roak: Solitude, features very simple subjects, including abandoned structures and landscapes;
Dawn Colsia: Celebration of Trees, includes a Kauri tree from a New Zealand rainforest and a Dawn Redwood from the Arnold Arboretum in Boston, Massachusetts;
Donna Tramontozzi: Optical Shards, reflections worth a second look;
Jessica Wolfe: Flora, a series of macro photos that provide a surprising glimpse into exotic flowers and everyday beauty;
Judith Panagotopulos: Aging, represents things that with age have lost their utility but have gained beauty in the processes of aging;
Jurgen Kedesdy: Crossing The Merrimack, is a project documenting each of the 45 bridges that cross the Merrimack River in New Hampshire and Massachusetts;
Kathleen Herr-Zaya: Urban Reflections;
Mary Buonanno: Ripened Beauty, images that explore the affect that aging has on organic matter and how the aging process reveals a different type of beauty;
Randi Freundlich: Children of the World/Boston, portraits (and stories) of children from immigrant families living in Boston;
Rick Branscomb: Boston at Night, concentrates on dark, atmospheric views of Boston.
Ruth Nelson: In Your Face -The Mannequins Look Back, shows the mannequins as active participants, looking at the camera as though they were human, with consciousness and attitude, meeting the world in their individual ways;
Silke Hase: Ocean’s Edge, a project that reflects the artist’s love of water and photography, using the historic wet plate collodion process.
Stephanie Smith: Once Upon a Time, a collaboration between the artist and her 15-year-old daughter, exploring fantasy and reality;
Stephen Shapiro: The Interesting Life of Bubbles, a study of bubbles in motion;
Sally Chapman: Yards of Faith, a project that studies the public proclamations of faith in the artist’s neighborhood; and
Trelawney Goodell: REFLECTIONS: A Moment in Time, shows images reflected on the surface of a building tell us about the surrounding environment, the lighting at that moment, and the surface on which the image is reflected.

Instructor Meg Birnbaum will be available to discuss the Photography Atelier at the reception on March 10th with anyone interested in joining the class.

Krista Wortendyke, (RE): Media

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(Re): media is an exploration of the way imagery and information from movies, videogames, newspapers, and the Internet come together to form our perception of war. As most have not experienced war, it is the media’s images that have informed our understanding of conflict. Wortendyke’s ongoing work examines violence through the lens of photography.

Wortendyke’s series, (RE): Media, is featured in the Atelier Gallery at the Griffin Museum of Photography January 14th through March 6th, 2016. An opening reception will take place on January 14th, 2016 from 7-8:30pm. Yorgos Efthymiadis will lead a members’ talk at 6:15pm before the reception. The talk and reception are free.

“Explosions are war’s most universal and most spectacular signifiers,” says Wortendyke. “I have made use of these magnetizing [media] images to show not only how the lines between fiction and non-fiction blur, but also to show how a mediated experience can become indecipherable from a real experience.”

Krista Wortendyke is a Chicago-based conceptual artist. She received her MFA in Photography from Columbia College in 2007. Her work has been exhibited at the Museum of Contemporary Photography, Packer Schopf Gallery and David Weinberg Gallery in Chicago, SOHO20 Gallery in New York, and many other venues across the United States. Additionally, Krista’s work is part of the permanent collection at the Museum of Fine Arts Houston and the Museum of Contemporary Photography. Krista is currently an adjunct professor of photography at Columbia College Chicago and Northeastern Illinois University.

Harvey Stein Workshop Exhibit-Photographing People

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This exhibition is a direct result of a workshop for the Griffin Museum led by photographer and educator Harvey Stein. The 3-day workshop took place in June 2015 on the streets of Boston. It focused on providing each student knowledge of and experience in photographing people in a variety of ways, including on the street, indoor locations, and in the subject’s environment. The workshop also focused on creating inventive portraits that are personally based and meaningful. Stein juried the images for this exhibition from photographs submitted by workshop participants.

The Griffin Museum will be offering Harvey Stein’s 3-day Photographing People workshop again in June 2016. Watch for details on our website.

Exhibitors include: Kay Aubrey, Robert Bass, William Daniels, Pippi Ellison, Rebecca Field, Vivien Goldman, Sureita Hockley, Helena Long, Judith Panagotopulos, Tiziana Rosso, Eileen Scullen, Shawn Soni, Joe Staska, Anne Umphrey, and David Whitney.

Patrick Nagatani: Themes and Variations

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For more than 30 years Patrick Nagatani has been sharing his narratives through the photographs he makes. Nagatani’s images take you on fascinating journeys that explore history, personal philosophy, culture, spirituality, fantasy and reality. Images from seven major bodies of work that Nagatani has completed are presented at the Griffin Museum as well as a literary and photographic novel, “The Race,” that he is currently creating with other artists.

Nagatani’s exhibition, Themes and Variations, is featured in the Main Gallery, Atelier Gallery and Griffin Gallery at the Griffin Museum in Winchester October 8 through November 29, 2015. An opening reception with the artist takes place on October 8, 7-8:30 p.m. Patrick Nagatani will give a gallery talk and tour of Themes and Variations at 5:00 PM. The talk is FREE for members, $10 nonmembers.

“….For Nagatani, a photograph could be more than a document of reality. He made photographs, used mixed media — always trying to stretch photographic conventions,” says Barbara Hitchcock, curator and organizer of the exhibition Patrick Nagatani: Themes and Variations, an independent Curator and former Curator of the Polaroid Collection.

Patrick Nagatani says, “There’s a certain edge to photography that’s really restricting.” He goes on to say, “It’s a controlled medium, especially in the process. And I just want to throw that control out as much as possible.”

Once a graduate student of Robert Heinecken’s at UCLA, Nagatani’s resistance to the constraints of traditional photographic practice is in keeping with his training. Time spent in Hollywood learning from models and sets for movies, among them Blade Runner and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, also influenced his desire to push boundaries. He envisioned a more expansive, plastic kind of photography.

For his creative photography, Nagatani has received numerous awards, among them, the Aaron Siskind Foundation Individual Photographer’s Fellowship, The Kraszna-Krausz Award for his book Nuclear Enchantment, the Leopold Godowsky Jr. Color Photography Award, the Eliot Porter Fellowship in New Mexico, the California Distinguished Artist Award from the National Art Education Association, and National Endowment for the Arts Visual Artist Fellowships in 1984 and 1992.

A professor of Art and Art History at the University of New Mexico where he taught for 20 years, Nagatani retired in 2006. The Society of Photographic Education conferred upon him the Honored Educator Award in 2008, and, in 2003, New Mexico’s then Governor Bill Richardson presented Nagatani with the “Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts.” Nagatani has served as a panelist for the Illinois Art Council, Southern Arts Federation, Massachusetts Council on the Arts and Humanities, Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation, California Arts Council, and the National Endowment for the Arts. He remains an active member of the Atomic Photographer’s Guild.

Patrick Nagatani: Themes and Variations was partially drawn from Desire for Magic – Patrick Nagatani 1978-2008, the exhibition and monograph, curated by Michele M. Penhall, Curator of Prints and Photographs at the University of New Mexico Art Museum, Albuquerque. That exhibition traveled to the Japanese American National Museum in Los Angeles and was exhibited at the Clay Center for the Arts and Sciences of West Virginia.

The Griffin Museum of Photography is pleased to offer a distinctive and expanded version of the initial exhibition.

PHOTOGRAPHY ATELIER 22

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The Photography Atelier 22 and Atelier 2.0 will present an exhibit of student artwork from September 10th to September 28th, 2015. The Atelier is a course for intermediate and advanced photographers offered by the Griffin Museum of Photography. The Atelier 2.0 is a peer and facilitator critique class. You are invited to come view the photographs at the Griffin Museum, 67 Shore Road, Winchester, Massachusetts 01890.

On Thursday, September 10th, the public is invited to attend the artists’ opening night reception from 6:30-8:30 p.m. at the Griffin Museum.

Photography Atelier Instructor and Photographer Meg Birnbaum shared, “The Photography Atelier has such a long and rich history, I’m honored to be leading this workshop for emerging photographers with Amy Rindskopf assisting. The talent among the 18 members of this group show is varied and inspiring — from our relationship with animals, landscapes, and still life arrangements, to exploding light bulbs and motherhood — the show is very satisfying feast for the eyes and soul.”

Work by 2015 Atelier members includes:
Meredith Abenaim: The One Love Project, images exploring mothering an only child; Gregory Albertson: Terra Incognita, alternative landscapes of unexplored worlds; Amy Thompson Avishai: Long Days, Short Years, photographs of her two young daughters that explore time passing and the freedom to be; Vicki Diez-Canseco; Miren Etcheverry: Recollection, revisiting collected objects and recalling the memories they evoke; Roger Galburt: Bulb Spirits, photographs of normal incandescent light bulbs, broken and exposed to air, quickly releasing white smoke; Jess Hauserman: Either, Or, diptychs discussing the public restroom experience through gender ideologies; Tira Khan: What Was/What Is: Remembrance of My Father, photographs layering past memories with present day landscapes; Lee Kilpatrick: Patterns of Prosperity, a panoramic view of consumer choice in the United States; Cheryl Prevost: Abstract Elements, abstracted relationships of natural elements manifested throughout nature; Amy Rindskopf: Left Over, images from a quiet kitchen; Janet Smith: Sticks & Stones, tranquil and whimsical images of these found objects; Joseph Staska: Dream Boats-Abandoned Ships, a photo series of boats representing lost dreams; Donna Tramontozzi: When Animals Meet, images of moments when humans and animals connect; Piet Visser: Eye of the Storm, photographs celebrating solitude and tranquility in a frantic and complicated world; Andrea Waxler: Horses, Top Hats and Old Hollywood, power, elegance, grace, and a touch of Old Hollywood; David Whitney: The Nature of Cities, images capturing interactions between natural and urban environments; Julie Williams-Krishnan: Seven-Eight, laying straight images of childhood objects.

Atelier 2.0 artists include Bob Avakian, Nan Collins, James Hunt, David Feigenbaum , Astrid Reischwitz, Amy Rindskopf and Ellen Slotnick

About the class:
Photography Atelier, in its nineteenth year, is a unique portfolio-making course for emerging to advanced photographers. In addition to guidance and support in the creation of a body of work, the class prepares artists to market, exhibit, and present their work to industry professionals. Each participant in the Atelier presents a final project in the form of a print portfolio, a photographic book or album, a slide show, or a mixed media presentation. In every Atelier, students hang a gallery exhibition and produce work for their own pages on the Atelier website. To see the photography of present and past Atelier students and teachers, please visit www.photographyatelier.org. Instructor Meg Birnbaum will be happy to discuss the Photography Atelier at the reception on September 10th with anyone interested in joining the class.

Photo critique is a critically important element of the Photography Atelier and is the main focus of Atelier 2.0. There are invited guest speakers every other class who discuss their photographic trajectory and creative process.

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