For the third year, The Griffin Museum has invited all of its current members to exhibit in the Winter Solstice Exhibition. From across the world, artists entered one piece to be on display for December 2015. Over 140 photographs are represented in the Main Gallery of the Griffin and display a spectrum of genres and processes. The opening reception is Thursday, December 10, 2015 from 6-8pm. Sales are encouraged and many artists have donated the proceeds back to the Griffin.
Griffin Main Gallery
Patrick Nagatani: Themes and Variations
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
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.
21st Juried Show: The Peter Urban Legacy Exhibition
The juror for the Griffin’s Juried show this year was Jim Casper. Jim started LensCulture in 2004 to explore the diverse ways photography is used in the arts, media and daily life in cultures around the world. Since then, Lens Culture has grown to be regarded as a highly valuable, engaging and inspiring resource for photographers, students and art lovers. In 2010, Jim teamed up with international partners to launch the annual LensCulture FotoFest Paris portfolio reviews, which brought together participants from over 45 countries each November. Prior to Lens Culture, Jim served as founder and president of Casper Design Group for 20 years, an international branding and corporate communications design firm based in Berkeley, CA. He currently lives in Paris.
“The 2015 Griffin Awards attracted remarkably diverse, sophisticated and refined submissions from photographers who explore their art across many genres,” says Casper.
The 21tst Griffin Museum Juried Exhibition is on display in the Main Gallery of the Griffin Museum July 9 through August 30, 2015. An opening reception is July 9, 7-8:30 p.m. with exhibit awardee Dave Jordano in attendance. Dave Jordano will do a lecture at 5:00 PM at the Griffin Museum in Winchester. The event is free to members and $7 to nonmembers. It requires an RSVP. The opening reception is free to all but also requires an RSVP. Photographer Lindsey Beal will do a members’ talk at 6:30 pm on July 9, 2015.
Casper also says that, “The 54 photographs in my selection represent a delightful range of approaches — each of which somehow celebrates the idea and the medium of photography itself — as well as the wild worlds we live in physically and in our imaginations. It’s a joy to discover so many creative people who are so fluent in the visual language of photography.”
For the second year the 21st Juried Show is held in honor of the legacy of Peter Urban a celebrated, Boston-based photographer who passed away in 2009 after a long battle with cancer. Urban was renowned for his success in both the commercial and artistic realm. In the spirit of Peter’s success creating a career with a balance of commercial and artistic work, his family has partnered with the Arts & Business Council of Greater Boston and the Griffin Museum of Photography to produce opportunities for other photographers to grow their careers.
Alongside the juried exhibition, the Arts and Business Council is again organizing a series of professional development workshops presented by a diverse range of thought leaders as a legacy to Peter Urban. These workshops will share instrumental ideas, methods and tools to help build the business and legal foundation of a thriving artistic practice.
The Peter Urban Legacy Award went to Dave Jordano. The Arthur Griffin Legacy Award went to Kay Kenny and the Griffin Award went to Susan DeLeo.
The photographers are: Jeremy Ackman, Ron Anderson, Matt Cegelis, Kindra Clineff, Debi Cornwall, Peter Curran, Susan DeLeo, Marcus DeSieno, Francisco Diaz and Deb Young, Corinne DiPietro, Barbara Ford Doyle, Daniel Duarte, Pippi Ellison, Rachel Ellner, Odette England, Ellen Feldman, Hiroshi Imai, Doug Johnson, Dave Jordano, Matthew Kamholtz, Lynn Karlin, Aubrey J. Kauffman, Marky Kauffmann, Steven Keirstead, Kay Kenny, Lee Kilpatrick, Michael Kriegh, Margaret Lampert, Isa Leshko, Cristina Llerena, Richard Coty, Darrell Matsumoto, Charles Mazel, Lisa McCarty, Ralph Mercer, Nick Meyer, Nancy Newberry, Barbara Peacock, Lisa Redburn, Dale M. Reid, Katherine Richmond, Brian Rosa, Russ Rowland, Don Russell, Hope Schreiber, Michael Seif, Wendy Seller, David Shannon-Lier, Marie Triller, Cara Lee Wade, Paul Wainwright, Sandra Chen Weinstein, Dianne Yudelson and Kalman Zabarsky.
The Griffin Museum of Photography has selected four photographers from the juried show submissions for future exhibitions in 2015. These photographers are:
Rebecca Clark, Eliot Dudik, Cassandra Klos and Molly Lamb
PhotoSynthesis X
By creating photographic portraits of themselves and their surroundings, students from the Boston Arts Academy and Winchester High School have been exploring their sense of self and place in a unique collaborative program at the Griffin Museum.
In its tenth year, the 5-month program connects approximately 40 students – 20 from each school – with each other and with professional photographers. The goal is to increase students’ awareness of the art of photography, as well as how being from different programs and different schools affects their approach to the same project.
The students were given the task of creating a body of work that communicates a sense of self and place. They were encouraged to explore the importance of props, the environment, facial expression, metaphor, and body language in portrait photography.
Students met with Nancy Grace Horton, a photographer, educator and resident of New Hampshire. Horton described her artistic path in creating bodies of work and honed her focus on her work Ms. Behaviour.
Students also met with Sam Sweezy, a professional fine art and commercial photographer and educator who lives in Arlington, MA. He has exhibited at major photography venues including the George Eastman House in Rochester, NY.
Alison Nordstrom, former curator of the George Eastman House in Rochester, N.Y., and Sweezy gathered with students for a group discussion of the work and a final edit of the exhibition.
“In collaboration and through creative discourse these students have grown,” said Paula Tognarelli, executive director of the Griffin Museum. “We are very pleased to be able to share this year’s students’ work. We thank the mentors for providing a very meaningful experience for the students. We also want to thank the Griffin Foundation and the Murphy Foundation, whose continued commitment to this project made learning possible. To paraphrase Elliot Eisner, the arts enabled these students to have an experience that they could have from no other source.’’
The results are on exhibit in PhotoSynthesis X in the Main Gallery of the Griffin Museum June 11 – June 29. An opening reception is Thursday, June 11, 7-8:30 p.m. It is open to all.
Jerry Takigawa, False Food
Photographer and designer Jerry Takigawa has been a social and environmental advocate since 1969. In his series False Food, Takigawa speaks to the issue of plastics pollution specifically of the Albatross of the Midway Atoll who mistake plastic debris for food and literally starve to death.
Takigawa’s series, False Food, is featured in the Main Gallery at the Griffin Museum April 9 through June 5, 2015. An opening reception with the artist takes place on April 9, 7-8:30 p.m. Jerry Takigawa will give a gallery talk and tour of False Food at 6:00 PM. The talk is FREE.
“[False Food] is a way of taking an overwhelming environmental problem and finding a way to make it personal,” says Takigawa. “I have become acutely aware of the abundance of plastic in my life and in my world. The albatross have provided me with a new awareness of the web of life.”
Takigawa continues, “Creating these images helps me to integrate the tragedy of the [Albatross] with a sense of hope—hope that by telling and re-telling the story—observers may be inspired to act, not to turn away.”
“Jerry Takigawa doesn’t hit us over the head with preachy dialogue on the perils of plastics pollution in the artworks of False Food. Rather, he connects us with the issue more subtly,” says Paula Tognarelli, executive director of the Griffin Museum of Photography. “Through their quiet cadence, Takigawa’s photographs provoke further enquiry into the context of the source materials used. What a paradox it is to discover that such beauty points to the devastation of our oceans caused by industrial civilization,” says Tognarelli. “The photographs of False Food communicate a sense of preciousness as art objects, as well as articulating the dearness of our natural resources.”
Takigawa received a BFA, with an emphasis in painting, from San Francisco State University in 1967. He studied photography under Don Worth. While living in the San Francisco Bay Area, he utilized his art and design skills to help develop a pilot VISTA program (Volunteers in Service to America) in Oakland, California. In 1982, he became the first photographer to receive the Imogen Cunningham Award for color photography. Takigawa has served as past-president of People in Communications Arts (PiCA), a trustee for the Monterey Museum of Art, and currently serves as president for the Center for Photographic Art.
Takigawa’s work is in the permanent collection of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, the Brooklyn Museum of Art, the Crocker Art Museum, the Library of Congress, the Monterey Museum of Art, The San Francisco Foundation, the University of Louisville, Syntex Laboratories Inc., The Monterey Vineyard, the Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula, the Imogen Cunningham Trust, and the Monterey Bay Aquarium.
In honor of Earth Day on April 22, 2015 the museum will be open to the public for FREE all day.
Photography Atelier 21
Photography Atelier 21 will present an exhibit of student artwork from March 5 through March 29, 2015 at the Griffin Museum of Photography, 67 Shore Road, Winchester, Massachusetts, 01890. Photography Atelier is a course for intermediate and advanced photographers offered by the Griffin Museum of Photography and taught by Meg Birnbaum and course assistant, Amy Rindskopf.
On Thursday, March 5, the public is invited to view the artwork and meet the artists at a reception from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m.
Photography Atelier 21 members include:
Emily Belz: Memory Lines, photographic sequences connecting space, time and memory; Richard Cohen: Ambiguity of Cityspace, restructured images of urban windows shot in downtown Boston; Jennifer Coplon: Discovering Blackstone Square, a Boston South End park; Vicki Diez-Canseco: Shape Shift: A Part of the Whole; Estelle Disch: Phototransformations; David Feigenbaum: The Shadow Knows; Nancy Fulton: Woodland Light; Trelawney Goodell: A Celebration of Norway; Law Hamilton: Atlantic Waves: Grace and Movement; James Hunt: Spirituality and a Sense of Place: The Quabbin Wilderness; Lee Kilpatrick: A Case of You, a portrait of his sister’s last years before her death; Bonnie McCormick: Too Much Rum, pinhole multiple exposure images of the Caribbean; Vicki McKenna: A Sheaf of Stories, a selection of portraits from Italy; Judith Monteferrante: Glass: Realism to Abstraction; Skip Montello: Reflections of a Quarry Wall; Amy Rindskopf: Edible Geometry, a celebration of the growing season; Andrea Rosenthal: Fleeting Glimpses; Tiziana Rozzo: The Childhood of a Family; Dianne Schaefer: The Light You Cannot See, explorations in infrared photography; Elliot Schildkrout: Lost Memories, the abandoned Lincoln Amusement Park of Dartmouth, Mass; Ellen Slotnick, Quondam; Christy Stadelmaier: Arches; Joe Staska: Unsleeping, images from sleepless nights and 36-hour days; Maria Verrier: A True Self; Carol Van Loon: Barns, a journey back to the landscape of her youth after the death of her mother; Nadine Wallack: Shadows and Silhouettes: Nothing is Explained; Catherine Wilcox-Titus: Returned to Life, a series of still-life photographs.
About the class:
Photography Atelier, in its twentieth 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. Spring 2015 Instructor Meg Birnbaum, will be happy to discuss the Photography Atelier at the reception on March 5th with anyone interested in joining the class.
Brandon Thibodeaux, When Morning Comes
Dallas photographer Brandon Thibodeaux has been photographing in the Mississippi Delta since 2009. While his work makes specific reference to the rural black experience, in his work we see themes of faith, identity, and perseverance that are common to us all. Thibodeaux states that these are “the traits of strong men.”
Thibodeaux’s series, When Morning Comes, is featured in the Main Gallery at the Griffin Museum January 8 through March 1, 2015. An opening reception with the artists takes place on January 10, 7-8:30 p.m. Magdalena Solé has a gallery talk and tour of Mississippi Delta at 4:00 PM. Brandon Thibodeaux has a gallery talk and tour of When Morning Comes at 5 PM. Bryan David Griffith has a members’ talk on his exhibition The Last Bookstores at 6:15 PM. The talks are FREE.
“I first traveled to the [Delta] in the summer of 2009 because I needed to breathe after my own troubled times,” said Brandon Thibodeaux. “I was in search of something stronger than myself and attended its churches not to photograph but to cry and be redeemed and to just be a part of the place. I was there to listen as I prayed for a revelation.”
“Over the past five years I have witnessed signs of strength against struggle, humility amidst pride, and a promise for deliverance in the lives that I’ve come to know here,” says Thibodeaux. “This is a land stigmatized by poverty beneath a long shadow of racism. I do not wish to overlook this fact but rather look between it for evidence of the tender and yet unwavering human spirit that resides within its fabric.”
“Brandon Thibodeaux’s photographs describe a sort of “splendor” in the ordinary,” says Paula Tognarelli, executive director of the Griffin Museum of Photography. “Thibodeaux’s Delta narrative recalls a spiritual and humane dialogue with the land and its people.”
Brandon Thibodeaux is a freelance photographer for the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, MSNBC, Shell Oil and Time. He is a member of the photography collective MJR, based in New York City. His work has been recognized by American Photo Magazine, PDN, and the Oxford American lists him as one of their 100 Under 100, New Superstars of Southern Art 2012. He is the 2014 recipient of the Michael P. Smith Fund For Documentary Photography Grant.
This exhibition is sponsored in part by Critical Mass in Portland OR.
Winter Solstice Exhibition
For the second year, The Griffin Museum has invited all of its current members to exhibit in the Winter Solstice Exhibition. From across the world, artists entered one piece to be on display for December 2014. Over 140 photographs are represented in the Main Gallery of the Griffin and display a spectrum of genres and processes. The opening reception is Thursday, December 11, 2014 from 6-8pm. Sales are encouraged and many artists have donated the proceeds back to the Griffin.
HORACE AND AGNES: A LOVE STORY, ASIA KEPKA AND WRITER LYNN DOWLING
It was a hot summer day when Horace and Agnes: A Love Story came to life. A casual meeting with friends, an accordion, a red couch, a squirrel and a horse mask spurred on a photo shoot. The resulting narrative has blossomed into over 100 photographs of Horace and Agnes Groomsby and their friends accompanied by text.
Kepka and Dowling’s series, Horace and Agnes, is featured in the Main Gallery at the Griffin Museum October 14 through December 4, 2014. An opening reception with the artists is October 18, 7-8:30 p.m. A preview exhibition of the series is also on view at the Griffin at SoWa Gallery at 530 Harrison Ave in the South End through October 26th.
“Horace and Agnes met through random circumstance and their love for each other is literally blind,” says Asia Kepka. “They exemplify a fairy tale of what it would be like to fall in love with the right person…just because.”
“All of the characters are inspired by people and stories from Lynn’s and my past and present,” says Kepka. “Sometimes they are inspired by family members and sometimes by strangers we have encountered. The photographs are memories brought to life once again; recreated with as much detail possible to make the viewer become immersed in this magical and unique world,” she says.
“Present day life has its complications,” says Paula Tognarelli, executive director of the Griffin Museum of Photography. ”I believe the public is ready for a love story that at the same time is a visual delight for all ages.”
A gallery talk for museum members on Sisters of the Commonwealth by Meg Birnbaum will take place at 6:15 p.m. October 18, 2014, prior to the opening reception for all exhibits at 7 PM.