Jay Gould’s work integrates scientific topics into installation and constructed photographic projects. With “Escape Velocity” Gould has been photographing the tight-knit community of model rocketry enthusiasts. “Drive a good hour outside of nearly every American metropolitan area on a sunny Saturday morning and you may see small chutes of smoke lingering in the sky,” says Jay Gould. “If you are like me, you have even curiously traced these trails from time to time.”

A series of Gould’s photographs called “Escape Velocity,” is featured at the Griffin Museum at Digital Silver Imaging, 9 Brighton St., Belmont, MA, on March 26, 2015 through June 5, 2015. A closing reception will take place June 4, 2015 from 6-8 p.m.

“Many of these explorers are taking their first steps into hands-on science,” says Gould. “These less experienced members are guided by an entire community, in which many members have careers in aerospace.”

“Who hasn’t dreamed of conquering new frontiers,” says Paula Tognarelli executive director of the Griffin Museum of Photography. “It’s the desire to fly and the drive to know what lies beyond that spurs on these rocket explorers. Without curiosity many of us would still be huddled in a European township wondering of what cheese the moon was made.”

Jay Gould is an artist and a member of the faculty at the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA). Originally from Minneapolis, Minnesota, Gould received his BFA in photography from the University of Wisconsin and his MFA from the Savanna College of Art and Design. His work has won numerous national awards, such as the Berenice Abbott Prize for an emerging photographer, the Jeannie Pierce Award, and First Place at the Newspace Center for Photography’s International Juried Exhibition. _Gould’s work is widely exhibited around the country making solo and group show appearances at the Fridman Gallery in NYC, the University of Notre Dame, The Julia Dean Gallery in Los Angeles, the Fort Collins Museum of Contemporary Art, he Urban Institute for Contemporary Arts in Grand Rapids, Michigan, the Griffin Museum of Photography and the Center for Maine Contemporary Art. Gould is also a longtime member of the faculty at the Maine Media Workshops and is currently serving as the Chair of the Society for Photographic Education’s Mid Atlantic Region.

The exhibit is open to the public Mondays through Fridays, 9:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m.