Deana Lawson: Corporeal

/in

Deana Lawson: Corporeal
November 2–December 23, 2009
Gallery Reception: November 5, 2009, 5:00–8:00pm

Light Work is pleased to announce the exhibition Corporeal, featuring the work of Deana Lawson.

Lawson’s photographs examine how the body informs personal, political, and historical identities.
At first glance, Lawson’s images have a seemingly straightforward quality that dissolves into a complex set of questions about representation of the self, the construction of notions of beauty, and the nature of photographing, questions that will never have clear and finite answers, no matter how hard and long we look.

Added dynamic layers emerge from the photographs as many subjects appear nude. Sometimes this exposure seems to act as a passport direct to a hidden truth, but with other images, we must come to terms with an uncomfortable feeling of perhaps hitting an invisible barrier between what is and what is not meant to be seen. The beauty of Lawson’s images is that we can’t turn away, even in this uncertainty.

Lawson holds an MFA in Photography from Rhode Island School of Design and has received numerous awards, such as fellowships with the New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA) and The Photography Institute at Columbia University. Her work has received national recognition and is exhibited widely at venues like The Print Center in Philadelphia, PA, and the Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY.

Also on view at this time is the exhibition Artists at Work: Transmedia Photo Faculty. For many years Light Work has enjoyed a close affiliation with the Art Photography department in the College of Visual and Performing Arts. The faculty and students of Art Photo interact with Light Work’s roster of international artists through lectures, internships, and classroom visits. In addition, they utilize the Community Darkrooms facilities and take full advantage of the expertise of the Light Work staff. Together we share an energy, passion, and commitment to contemporary art and photography. The exhibition Artists At Work: Transmedia Photo Faculty highlights this relationship by featuring work by Doug Dubois, Laura Heyman, Yasser Aggour, John Mannion, and Aaron Hraba in the Light Work Hallway Gallery.

Light Work will host a gallery reception on Thursday, November 5, 2009 from 5–8pm to celebrate these exhibitions.

Gallery hours for these exhibitions are Sunday to Friday, 10am–6pm, and by appointment. To schedule an appointment, please call 315-443-1300. Both the exhibition and reception are free and open to the public. Paid parking is available in the Marion Parking Lot and Booth Garage.

Light Work invites groups and individuals to schedule tours and gallery talks of the exhibition and facility. Light Work is a non-profit, artist-run organization dedicated to the support of artists working in photography and electronic media. Light Work is a member of CMAC, the Coalition of Museum and Art Centers at Syracuse University.

For more information about any of these exhibitions, please contact Jessica Heckman at Light Work, 315-443-1300 or jhheckma@syr.edu.

**Digital press images and image information from both exhibitions are available upon request.

Light Work and P.E.A.C.E. Inc.: Photography at the Little White House of Hope

/in

Photography at the Little White House of Hope:
Collaborations between Light Work and P.E.A.C.E. Inc. Westside Family Resource Center

In August 2009, artist Stephen Mahan worked with Light Work and P.E.A.C.E. Incorporated Westside Family Resource Center (WFRC), also known as the Little White House of Hope, to conduct a workshop for teens about photography, identity and community. When he arrived with 20 digital cameras, he found a unique and vibrant community center run by Mary Alice Smothers and her colleagues. The WFRC is located on Wyoming Street and offers a variety of services and programs to families that live in and around the Near Westside, including employment support, youth activities, advocacy and resource development and education life skills. Their mission is to help people in the community realize their potential for becoming self-sufficient.

Smothers and Mahan made a great team with their combined passion and belief in the strength of the human spirit, as well as their understanding of how creating images of community and identity can foster self esteem, and build awareness and pride in the southwest side’s unique and richly diverse community. At the end of the workshop, large-scale digital photographs were installed across the street from the Little White House of Hope on West Street by local business Media Finishings. The exhibition will be up indefinitely, and the hope is that it will continue to grow over time.

The partnership between Mahan and WFRC is also deeply in line with the goals and efforts of the Near Westside Initiative (NWSI), a nonprofit corporation housed at Syracuse University and partnering with the greater Near Westside community. The NWSI, owners of the Case Supply Warehouse, were thrilled to showcase the artwork as public art on the side of the building. “This project has been great on so many levels. It has educated youth, it has encouraged and fostered the arts, and it has beautified a widely visible building in Syracuse, bringing great attention to the Near Westside community, and the residents that live there” says Maarten Jacobs, director of the Near Westside Initiative.

Mahan is an artist, photographer, educator and community activist. He has worked with Light Work/Community Darkrooms on numerous occasions. His innovative curriculum was inspired by a national movement to promote literacy through the arts and is proving to be a great success in promoting communication skills and self esteem.

Light Work is a nonprofit, artist-run, photo and imaging center in Syracuse, N.Y. Our mission is to support emerging and under-recognized artists working in photo and photo-based media. We do this through exhibitions, publications and an internationally renowned Artist-in-Residence Program. We also seek to foster an appreciation and understanding of contemporary photography in Central New York through classes, workshops, lectures and community programming.

For more information contact, Mary Lee Hodgens, program manager, 315-443-5785.

Barry Anderson: Intermissions

/in

Barry Anderson: Intermissions
August 14–October 21, 2009
Reception with Syracuse Symposium Lecture Event: Tuesday, September 29
(Reception 5–6pm, Lecture 6–8pm)

Light Work is pleased to announce Intermissions, an innovative art exhibition and related programs featuring the video and photographic art of Kansas City artist Barry Anderson. In a time of economic uncertainty and other societal stresses, this project provides viewers a welcomed artistic interruption to daily life. Anderson’s work, and the entire project, is designed to bring art into the community, and focuses on reminding people of the importance of remembering to stop and enjoy the moment. This exhibition will reach the community as a whole, including people who may not normally visit a gallery—they may come across the project by walking by a video projected onto a building or by driving past a billboard whose function is as a piece of art instead of an advertisement.

Anderson’s colorful video pieces include abstract patterns, nature scenes, and semi-nostalgic images from decade-old advertising. Each piece creates a good-natured, introspective scene that contrasts the busy settings where the work is shown. Anderson’s work addresses our cultural need to escape the onslaught of media input through isolated fantasy worlds. By slowing or re-interpreting space and time, he strives to identify the existence of introspective spaces within the everyday, proposing that we don’t need to retreat, but to re-envision and re-think what is already around us. Light Work’s project places video art and photographs at multiple venues across Syracuse, making it accessible to the general community and creating many opportunities for meaningful interaction with the work.

The level of collaboration that is provided through this exhibition and programming is an exciting step for the arts in Syracuse, and will bring a common thread through all involved spaces during the exhibition period. Embracing the concept of art intervention, the exhibition will expand beyond Light Work’s main gallery to many venues in town, thereby creating dozens of points for interaction both indoors and outdoors. This represents a departure from Light Work’s usual photography exhibitions and allows the entire community to become engaged with the work. The following partners will participate in this unique collaboration with the Light Work gallery spaces: the Everson Museum of Art, multiple venues at Syracuse University, SUArt Galleries, Syracuse Symposium, The Warehouse, the Urban Video Project, Orange TV Network, Community Folk Art Center, the Red House Arts Center, and more. Exhibition sites also include public spaces such as billboards and multiple video projections onto buildings in downtown Syracuse.

Find out what work will be shown where and when by consulting the fold-out maps available at all participating venues and an animated map on Light Work’s flat-panel screen. Maps are also available for download from Light Work’s website at www.lightwork.org. Visit Light Work’s blog or Facebook page for the latest event updates, photos, and other exhibition-related news. Planned events include a gallery reception and lecture by the artist as part of the Syracuse Symposium programming, workshops, tours, among other exciting programs. This project is receiving support from Syracuse Symposium, the Division of Student Affairs Co-Curricular Fee, and the Central New York Community Foundation.

Anderson’s work has been shown in solo and group exhibitions throughout the country, as well as in Thailand, South America, Cuba, and the UK. Recent exhibition venues include the Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art in Overland Park, KS; Packer Schopf Gallery in Chicago, IL; Salina Art Center in Salina, KS; Gallery 210 at the University of Missouri in St. Louis; Hotcakes Gallery in Milwaukee; and the Centre for Contemporary Photography in Toronto. He participated in Light Work’s Artist-in-Residence Program in 2006. Anderson was born in Greenville, TX. He holds an MFA from Indiana University. Anderson’s installations, single-channel work, and still photography can be seen on his website.

This project is receiving support from Syracuse Symposium, the Division of Student Affairs Co-Curricular Fee, the Central New York Community Foundation, and Lamar Outdoor Advertising. Syracuse Symposium is a semester-long intellectual and artistic festival celebrating interdisciplinary thinking, imagining, and creating, presented by The College of Arts and Sciences to the entire Syracuse community. The Central New York Community Foundation connects the generosity of donors with community needs by making grants to organizations working to enhance the quality of life of those who live and work in Central New York.

Gallery hours at Light Work are Sunday to Tuesday, 10am–10pm; Wednesday to Friday, 10am–6pm; and by appointment. The gallery is closed during Syracuse University holidays. To schedule an appointment, please call 315-443-1300. Both the exhibition and reception are free and open to the public. Paid parking is available in the Marion parking lot and Booth Garage.

Light Work invites groups and individuals to schedule tours and gallery talks of the exhibition and facility. Light Work is a non-profit, artist-run organization dedicated to the support of artists working in photography and electronic media. Light Work is a member of CMAC, the Coalition of Museum and Art Centers at Syracuse University.

For more information about any of these exhibitions, please contact Jessica Heckman at Light Work, 315-443-1300 or jhheckma@syr.edu.

**Digital press images and image information from both exhibitions are available upon request.

Admas Habteslasie: Limbo

/in

Admas Habteslasie—Limbo
March 16–June 12, 2009
Spoken-Word Poetry Performance and Gallery Reception: April 9, 2009, 5:30–8:00pm

Light Work is pleased to announce the exhibition Limbo, featuring the work of Admas Habteslasie. The images from this series depict a graceful yet unusually honest and insightful snapshot of Eritrea, an East African country suspended in an unsettled state between war and peace.

Eritrea warred with neighboring Ethiopia for thirty years before gaining independence in 1991. Then, in 1998, they entered another war with Ethiopia that lasted two years. Today the war-torn country is yet again at the brink of war with their neighbor. Years of unrest have left the people of Eritrea waiting for life to improve. According to Habteslasie, “Transitory states become permanent; empty villas, destroyed old buildings and unfinished new buildings dot the landscape, monuments to the suspension of history. The collision between Eritrea’s proud historical narrative and the bleak ennui of the present has produced an obsessive focus on the future. Reconstruction and infrastructure development are energetically driven forward whilst the economy remains essentially shut off from the outside world.” The images in the Limboexhibition capture both destruction and construction, both the unhealed wounds of war and a fierce optimism and hope for a brighter future.

Habteslasie was born in Kuwait and his parents are Eritrean. He received his MA from the London College of Communication in photojournalism and documentary photography. His photographic projects look at the ideas of identity and history, and reevaluation of our relationship with historical process. His work has been exhibited at venues such as Flowers East and 198 Gallery in London. His work has also been published inSource Magazine.

Habteslasie participated in Light Work’s Artist-in-Residence program in June 2008 through a collaboration with London-based charity Autograph ABP. Each year Light Work welcomes one Artist-in-Residence selected through Autograph ABP, which works internationally to educate the public about photography, with a particular emphasis on issues of cultural identity and human rights. Habteslasie was the tenth artist to participate in the Artist-in-Residence program through the collaboration. For more information about Autograph ABP visit www.autograph-abp.co.uk.

Light Work will feature an evening with the artist on April 9 from 5:30 to 8:00pm. The evening will begin with a spoken-word poetry performance by Verbal Blend, followed by a question and answer session with Habteslasie, and a gallery reception. Verbal Blend is a spoken-word poetry program sponsored by Syracuse University’s Office of Multicultural Affairs, designed to enhance participants’ confidence in writing and performing original poems. The program comprises of a five-week workshop series on poetry forms and formats, journal entry, and peer-reviews. Participants get the opportunity to showcase their work at public venues such as open mic nights. For this event, a group of SU students, high school students, and community members have prepared spoken-word performances in response to Habteslasie’s images.

Also on view at this time is As it Happens: Artists-in-Residence at Light Work. This exhibition, curated by Syracuse University Museum Studies graduate student Josh Brilliant, features work by participants in Light Work’s Artist-in-Residence program. The exhibition celebrates Light Work’s commitment to supporting emerging and under-recognized artists by featuring work that has been donated to the Light Work Collection by participants in the program. Artists included in this exhibition include Kelli Connell, Cristina Fraire, Tony Gleaton, Suzanne Mejean, Peggy Nolan, Christine Osinski, and Amy Stein.

Gallery hours for these exhibitions are Sunday to Friday, 10am–6pm, and by appointment. To schedule an appointment, please call 315-443-1300. Both the exhibition and reception are free and open to the public. Paid parking is available in the Marion Parking Lot and Booth Garage.

Light Work invites groups and individuals to schedule tours and gallery talks of the exhibition and facility. Light Work is a non-profit, artist-run organization dedicated to the support of artists working in photography and electronic media. Light Work is a member of CMAC, the Coalition of Museum and Art Centers at Syracuse University.

For more information about any of these exhibitions, please contact Jessica Heckman at Light Work, 315-443-1300 or jhheckma@syr.edu.

**Digital press images and image information from both exhibitions are available upon request.

Artist Showcase: Images by Jane Walker

/in

Artist Showcase: Images by Jane Walker
March 16–April 16, 2009
Spoken-Word Poetry Performance and Gallery Reception: April 9, 2009, 5:30–8:00pm

Light Work is pleased to announce the exhibition Artist Showcase: Images by Jane Walker on view in the Community Darkrooms Gallery. The images in this exhibition capture portraits of people with their animals. Walker grew up in Corning and has lived in the Finger Lakes region of New York most of her life. Her deep connection with the people and the land inform her environmental portraits of people and their pets.

According to Walker, there are three elements central to each of the images in this exhibition—the place, the person, and the animal. She states, “The most enjoyable aspect of this portrait process has been the time spent with the people. I slow down, think about who they are and see them. All my human subjects have been open and cooperative, patiently waiting as I attempt to get the image I want. Animals are not quite as accommodating, but they do help the person relax by sharing the spotlight. When I see my subject in a print, a persona I had not seen before will often emerge. It is that essence of the person I try to capture.”

Jane Walker lives in Freeville, NY with her husband, two daughters, five dogs, six canaries, toad, flock of chickens, herd of goats, a cat and, during the summer, turkeys, pigs, and a vegetable garden, all of which contribute to her passion for photographing people with their animals.

Light Work will feature an evening with the artists on April 9 from 5:30 to 8:00pm. The evening will begin with a spoken-word poetry performance by Verbal Blend, followed by a question and answer session with Admas Habteslasie, whose Limbo series is on view in Light Work’s main gallery. This event will be followed by a gallery reception. Verbal Blend is a spoken-word poetry program sponsored by Syracuse University’s Office of Multicultural Affairs, designed to enhance participants’ confidence in writing and performing original poems. For this event, a group of SU students, high school students, and community members have prepared spoken-word performances in response to Habteslasie’s images.

Also on view at this time is As it Happens: Artists-in-Residence at Light Work. This exhibition, curated by Syracuse University Museum Studies graduate student Josh Brilliant, features work by participants in Light Work’s Artist-in-Residence program. The exhibition celebrates Light Work’s commitment to supporting emerging and under-recognized artists by featuring work that has been donated to the Light Work Collection by participants in the program. Artists included in this exhibition include Kelli Connell, Cristina Fraire, Tony Gleaton, Suzanne Mejean, Peggy Nolan, Christine Osinski, and Amy Stein.

Gallery hours for these exhibitions are Sunday to Friday, 10am–6pm, and by appointment. To schedule an appointment, please call 315-443-1300. Both the exhibition and reception are free and open to the public. Paid parking is available in the Marion Parking Lot and Booth Garage.

Light Work invites groups and individuals to schedule tours and gallery talks of the exhibition and facility. Light Work is a non-profit, artist-run organization dedicated to the support of artists working in photography and electronic media. Light Work is a member of CMAC, the Coalition of Museum and Art Centers at Syracuse University.

For more information about any of these exhibitions, please contact Jessica Heckman at Light Work, 315-443-1300 or jhheckma@syr.edu.

**Digital press images and image information from both exhibitions are available upon request.

Dawoud Bey, Lonnie Graham, Carrie Mae Weems, and Deborah Willis: Embracing Eatonville

/in

Embracing Eatonville
Exhibition Dates: February 1–May 29, 2009
Artist Lecture—Deborah Willis: April 8, 2009, 4:30pm

Light Work is pleased to announce the Embracing Eatonville exhibition, featuring the work of photographers Dawoud Bey, Lonnie Graham, Carrie Mae Weems, and Deborah Willis, on view in the Robert B. Menschel Photography Gallery in Syracuse University’s Schine Student Center. The exhibition was featured in Light Work’s main gallery in 2003, then proceeded to travel to various galleries throughout the country. In celebration of diversity, Light Work has decided to show this meaningful exhibition again in conjunction with a lecture by Deborah Willis to be held in April. A limited re-issue of the Eatonville Portfolio, which offers four exquisite signed prints will also be offered for sale from Light Work.

Embracing Eatonville is a photographic survey of Eatonville, FL, the oldest black incorporated town in the United States, and place where celebrated writer Zora Neale Hurston lived and worked. Beginning in January 2002 Bey, Graham, Weems, and Willis spent time in Eatonville taking photographs in an effort to provide a meaningful reflection of the town’s spirit and character, while concentrating on its social, political, and cultural landscape. In response to the unique character of the community and its history, these artists produced a diverse portrait of Eatonville using both traditional and interpretive documentary methods. The special project that enabled these artists to go to Eatonville was created by Light Work and sponsored by the CNY Community Foundation.

Deborah Willis, one of the nation’s leading historians of African American photography and curator of African American culture, will visit Syracuse University to talk about the importance of preserving the history of African American communities in Syracuse through a photography archive. She will speak on April 8 at 4:30pm in the Maxwell Auditorium. Willis’ presentation, sponsored by the South Side Initiative, Light Work, and the Onondaga Historical Association, is free and open to the public. Funding was provided by Syracuse University’s U.Encounter Grant.

Dawoud Bey received his MFA from Yale University School of Art, and is a professor of art and photography at Columbia College Chicago. He has received numerous awards and fellowships over the course of his artistic career, and is currently represented in the United States by Rhona Huffman Gallery in Chicago. His work is included in permanent collections throughout America and Europe, including the Art Institute of Chicago, the Brooklyn Museum, and the National Portrait Gallery London, among many others.

Lonnie Graham is the founder of the African/American Garden Project, a physical and cultural exchange program. He has exhibited his work internationally, and was awarded a Pew Fellowship in the Arts, one of the largest grants for an individual artist. He is presently a professor of Fine Arts at Pennsylvania State University and an instructor of special programs at the Barnes Foundation in Marion, PA.  He acts as a visiting instructor of Graduate Studies at San Francisco Art Institute, and is formerly a visiting professor at Haverford College in Philadelphia, PA. Graham’s work can be found in the permanent collections of the Addison Gallery of American Art in Andover, MA; the Museum of African American History in Detroit, MI; the Delaware Museum of Art in Wilmington, DE; and the Philadelphia Museum of Art, in Philadelphia, PA.

Carrie Mae Weems received a BA from the California Institute of the Arts and an MFA from the University of California at San Diego. She is an internationally recognized artist, and has won numerous awards and fellowships, including the 2005–2006 Joseph H. Hazen Rome Prize Fellowship, and the Pollack Krasner Foundation Grant in Photography. Her work has been exhibited internationally, including at the Museum of Modern Art, the International Center of Photography, and the Whitney Museum, among others. Weems’ work can be found in various permanent collections, such as at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, among others.

Deborah Willis received her BFA from Philadelphia College of Art, her MA from City University of New York, her MFA from Pratt Institute and her PhD from George Mason University. In 2005 she was a Guggenheim Fellow and Fletcher Fellow. She was a MacArthur Fellow in 2000. She is a professor of photography and imaging at the Tisch School of Arts, New York University. Her work has been exhibited nationwide, including at Scottsdale Contemporary Art Museum in Scottsdale, AZ; Hand Workshop Art Center in Richmond, VA; and the Frick Collection in Pittsburgh, PA, among others.

Light Work invites groups and individuals to schedule tours and gallery talks of the exhibition and facility. Light Work is a non-profit, artist-run organization dedicated to the support of artists working in photography and electronic media. Light Work is a member of CMAC, the Coalition of Museum and Art Centers at Syracuse University.

For more information about any of these exhibitions, please contact Jessica Heckman at Light Work, 315-443-1300 or jhheckma@syr.edu.

**Digital press images and image information from this exhibition are available upon request.

Ellen Garvens: Prosthesis

/in

Ellen Garvens—Prosthesis
January 14–March 5, 2009
Gallery Reception: January 29, 2009, 5–7pm

Light Work is pleased to announce its upcoming spring exhibition, Prosthesis, featuring the work of Ellen Garvens. We invite you to schedule tours and gallery talks, attend our gallery receptions, and visit any time to see the exhibitions. In Prosthesis, Ellen Garvens’ photographs and sculptures intersect and magnify each other as they reference the ever-present, formidable, and magnificent frailty of the human body. This exhibition unites photographs from Garvens’ Ambivalence series with photo-based sculptures from herConstructions series.

Garvens began creating the images from the Ambivalence series, which documents the manufacture of prosthetics, at around the same time the war in Iraq started. The prosthetics depicted in these straightforward and elegant photographs serve as reminders of the consequence of conflict and the ephemeral nature of humans who carry out that conflict. According to Mary Goodwin, assistant director at Light Work, “The Ambivalence photographs draw the contour of an exquisite interior armature, a system of support for the body that becomes visible, in this case, through the act of its replacement. Like a photograph, a prosthesis echoes the shape of what once was; its shape derives from an antecedent no longer present, signifying not only the passage of time but also the ephemeral nature and delicacy of the human form.”

The photo-based sculptures from Garvens’ body of work titled Constructions combine images of the body within delicate metal framings. In this series, hand tools, some from everyday life, such as scissors and pliers, and some, including probes and tooth extractors, more directly related to the maintenance of the body, integrate with images of hands and other overtly organic forms. Much as prosthetic devices contain the memory of the body, the hand-tools and metal framings of this series give form to the photographs within them. The Constructions bring the themes of the body and the revelation of its armature into three dimensions.

Garvens received a BS in Art from the University of Wisconsin, and both an MA and MFA from the University of New Mexico. Her work has been exhibited nationwide, including at such venues as Solomon Fine Art in Seattle, WA; Jayne H. Baum Gallery in New York, NY; Cleveland Center for Contemporary Art in Cleveland, OH; Fotofest International in Houston, TX; and Dolby Chadwick Gallery in San Francisco, CA, among others. She has received numerous grants, awards, and fellowships, including a Royalty Research Fund Grant and an Artist Trust Fellowship from the Washington State Arts Commission, among others. Her work is included in permanent collections at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, NY; Houston Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, TX; Allen Memorial Art Museum in Oberlin, OH; and Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, CT.

Also on view at this time is the Transmedia Photography Annual featuring the work of students in Syracuse University’s College of Visual and Performing Arts. Gallery hours for these exhibitions are Sunday to Friday, 10am–6pm, and by appointment. To schedule an appointment, please call 315-443-1300. Both the exhibition and reception are free and open to the public. Paid parking is available in the Marion Parking Lot and Booth Garage.

Light Work invites groups and individuals to schedule tours and gallery talks of the exhibition and facility. Light Work is a non-profit, artist-run organization dedicated to the support of artists working in photography and electronic media. Light Work is a member of CMAC, the Coalition of Museum and Art Centers at Syracuse University.

For more information about any of these exhibitions, please contact Jessica Heckman at Light Work, 315-443-1300 or jhheckma@syr.edu.

**Digital press images and image information from this exhibition are available upon request.

Angie Buckley, Pedro Isztin, Cyrus Karimipour, and Paula Luttringer

/in

Tracing Memory: Photographs by Angie Buckley, Pedro Isztin, Cyrus Karimipour, and Paula Luttringer
Guest curated by Miriam Romais
November 3–December 31, 2008
Gallery Reception: Thursday, November 13, 2008. 5–8:00pm

Light Work is pleased to announce our upcoming exhibition, Tracing Memory: Photographs by Angie Buckley, Pedro Isztin, Cyrus Karimipour, and Paula Luttringer, guest curated by Miriam Romais of En Foco.

Romais curated this exhibition explore what makes a thought become a memory. She states, “The most emotionally laden experiences persist, and those left untouched, most likely become a memory trace…fragile and ephemeral.” The artists chosen for this exhibition create photographs that look at the idea of remembrance—letting go and making sense of past events, and using those memories to understand who they are today.

Growing up with a mother from Thailand and a Caucasian American father, Angie Buckley did not know her family history for many years. She relied on the conflicting memories and stories of relatives to piece together her heritage. Her images are created with a pinhole camera and cutouts of old family photographs, resulting in work that lies somewhere in between the real world and imagination. Buckley received her BFA in Photography from Ohio University, and her MFA in Photography from Arizona State University. She has received various awards, and her work has been exhibited nationwide, including at the Southern Light Gallery in Texas, McDuffy Arts Center in Virginia, and New York University, among many others.

Pedro Isztin’s color portraits metaphorically integrate formative childhood memories, using them to heal the adult that child has become. Part of a larger series that emulates a life journey, Destino III: Transformation revisits, in Isztin’s words, the pain, joy and suffering that our psyches are stamped with, no matter how little or large those experiences as a child.” Isztin was born to a Colombian mother and Hungarian father, and his work explores his diverse heritage. He lives in Ottawa, Canada, and has exhibited internationally. He has received numerous awards and grants, including a Photography Project Grant from the Canada Council for the Arts, and an Ontario Arts Council Award.

Unlike the other artists, Cyrus Karimipour revels in the flexibility of memories, and uses his images to visually recreate them to depict how he remembers an event or encounter. In his series Invented Memory, he creates scenarios by breaking down his negatives and rearranging the fragments to then be re-photographed. His imagery becomes ambiguous, as if looking in on someone else’s dream. Karimipour received his BA from Oakland University in Michigan, and his MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art in Michigan. His work has been exhibited nationwide, including at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, the Museum of New Art in Michigan, and the Cleveland Institute of Art in Ohio, among others. His work has also been published in Harper’s Magazine, and The Detroit News, among others.

Paula Luttringer faces her own traumatic past, infusing her imagery with what other women remember about being abducted and held captive during Argentina’s Dirty War. Lamento de Los Muros (The Wailing of the Walls)consists of large black-and-white images, which depict the interior of the detention centers where thousands of people were held, tortured and “disappeared”. The images capture both history and memory. Luttringer was awarded a fellowship from the Guggenheim Foundation in 2001. Her work appears in the collections of the Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Buenos Aires; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; and George Eastman House, Rochester, NY. She currently lives and works in Buenos Aires and Paris.

Miriam Romais is the executive director of En Foco, a non-profit organization dedicated to cultural diversity in photography. Her work has been exhibited in museums and galleries throughout the U.S. and abroad. Her work is part of the book, video, and HBO project titled Americanos: Latino Life in the United States (Little Brown & Co, 1999). She participated in Light Work’s Artist-in-Residence program in 1996.

Also on view at this time is the 2008 Light Work Grants exhibition, featuring the work of photographers Kathy Morris and Paul Pearce, as well as art writer Nancy Keefe Rhodes’ research project on Syracuse photographer Marjorie Wilkins. Each year Light Work awards three grants to photographers, critics, or photo-historians who reside in Central New York. The Light Work Grants in Photography program, founded in 1973, is one of the longest-running photography fellowships in the United States.

Light Work will host a reception to celebrate these exhibitions on Thursday, November 13 from 5–8pm. Gallery hours are Sunday to Friday, 10am–6pm, and by appointment. To schedule an appointment, please call 315-443-1300. The exhibitions and reception are free and open to the public. Paid parking is available in the Marion Parking Lot and Booth Garage. Light Work invites groups and individuals to schedule tours and gallery talks of the exhibition and facility. Light Work is a nonprofit, artist-run organization dedicated to the support of artists working in photography and electronic media. Light Work is a member of CMAC, the Coalition of Museum and Art Centers at Syracuse University. For more information about any of these exhibitions, please contact Jessica Heckman at Light Work, 315-443-1300 or jhheckma@syr.edu.

**Digital press images from all exhibitions are available upon request.

Ernesto Pujol: Walk #1

/in

Ernesto Pujol—Walk #1
August 25-October 23, 2008
Gallery Reception: Friday, October 3, 2008. 5-8:30pm, with lecture from 7:00-8:30pm

Light Work is pleased to announce our upcoming exhibition, Walk #1, featuring the work of Ernesto Pujol.

The black-and-white digital images in this exhibition follow a figure clad in a black robe, Pujol himself, walking through a Civil War cemetery in South Carolina. The photographs are arranged in sequential order in the gallery, depicting a dialogue between the figure, nature, and architecture. According to René Paul Barilleaux, “A lush Southern landscape, ornate Victorian cast ironwork, carved marble statuary, and other picturesque elements appear as a counterpoint to the dark, nearly motionless walker.”

Pujol conceived this series as a combination between a performance (the walking) and installation. According to Pujol, he had avoided going to the cemetery for some time, but “When I first set foot in that city of the dead, I suddenly realized that it was the familiar environment I had dreamed about for years. I had experienced recurring dreams of marble arches and colonnades surrounded by gated gardens and water.” After beginning to photograph the area in a documentary style, he quickly realized that he needed to walk through the space in a performative way, which resulted in the photographs depicted in this exhibition.

In addition to the digital images, this exhibition also features the black robe worn in the photographs, displayed on a mannequin in the center of the gallery, as well as twelve small, framed, hand-blown glass plates hanging on the wall with the images. Each plate has a word painted on it, meant to evoke a personal or emotional response from the viewers in the gallery.

Pujol was born in Cuba and grew up in San Juan, Puerto Rico. He received his BA in humanities and painting from the Universidad de Puerto Rico, and his MFA in interdisciplinary art practice from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago. His work has been exhibited internationally, and he has received numerous awards and fellowships. In addition, Pujol’s work is included in various permanent collections, including at the McNay Art Museum in San Antonio, TX; the Herbert F. Johnson Museum at Cornell University; Casa de las Americas in Havana, Cuba; the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles; among many others. He participated in Light Work’s Artist-in-Residence program in 1999.

Also on view at this time is an exhibition titled Images of a Girl, Images of a Woman featuring the work of Rita Hammond. A nationally recognized artist and photographer, Hammond (1924-1999) was a dynamic and greatly admired presence in the Central New York art community. With audacity, intelligence, and humor, Hammond’s work reflected on major figures from the history of art and photography. Images of a Girl, Images of a Woman offers a body of photographs from Hammond’s long-time collaboration with Lynn Moser. The series juxtaposes images of Moser as a young girl in 1967 with images of her as a woman twenty years later, revealing the dramatic and intimate effects of time, reflected in both the subject and the perspective of the photographer. Freelance photographer, curator, and arts educator Gina Murtagh has worked with Light Work and Syracuse University Press to publish a book on this series of images. On September 8 at 6:00pm, Murtagh will present a lecture about Rita Hammond at Light Work in Watson Theater. Her book,Images of a Girl, Images of a Woman , will be available at the event for purchase. The book is also available through Syracuse University Press atwww.SyracuseUniversityPress.syr.edu. Hammond’s series A Due Voci is also on view at this time in the Community Darkrooms exhibition space.

Light Work will host a gallery reception to celebrate these exhibitions on Friday, October 3 from 5-8:30pm, with a lecture by Ernesto Pujol beginning at 7:00pm. This event is part of the Visible Memories Conference, which is presented by the Visual Arts and Cultures Cluster of The Central New York Humanities Corridor, made possible by a grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The Corridor is a large-scale partnership with Syracuse University, Cornell University, and the University of Rochester that connects scholarship in five other cluster areas: philosophy, linguistics, religions and cultures, musicology/music history, and humanities at the interface of science/technology. The conference will feature a screening by David Thorne, and plenary panels with noted scholars and artists including Patricia Zimmermann, George Legrady, Gregory Sholette, Phaedra Pezzullo, Cara Finnegan, and Andrea Hammer.   Pujol’s lecture is the keynote address for the conference, and the public is invited to attend the lecture and reception free of charge. For more conference information visit http://publicmemories.syr.edu.

Gallery hours are Sunday to Friday, 10am-6pm, and by appointment. To schedule an appointment, please call 315-443-1300. The exhibitions and reception are free and open to the public. Paid parking is available in the Marion Parking Lot and Booth Garage. Light Work invites groups and individuals to schedule tours and gallery talks of the exhibition and facility. Light Work is a nonprofit, artist-run organization dedicated to the support of artists working in photography and electronic media. Light Work is a member of CMAC, the Coalition of Museum and Art Centers at Syracuse University. For more information about any of these exhibitions, please contact Jessica Heckman at Light Work, 315-443-1300 or jhheckma@syr.edu.

*Digital Files of all press images are available upon request.

Blake Fitch: Expectations of Adolescence

/in

Blake Fitch — Expectations of Adolescence
April 1 – July 18, 2008
Gallery Reception: April 10, 2008, 5-8pm

Light Work is pleased to announce its upcoming exhibition, Expectations of Adolescence, featuring the work of Blake Fitch.

The images in this exhibition follow the lives of Kate, Fitch’s youngest sister, and Julia, her cousin, as they have grown from adolescence to young adults. The 10-year project captures the physical and emotional changes in the two girls in celebration of youthful beauty.

According to Fitch, “I hope to have captured the simple moments in their search for their own identity as it becomes publicly displayed—at a dance recital or simply by the way they look at themselves in the mirror—and then subsequently informs the various traits that are either incorporated or discarded on their way to becoming an adult.”

While it can be said that all works of art are in some way autobiographical, this notion seems particularly true when the subject is the artist’s family. Fitch has been able to draw out an autobiographical aspect of photography by shooting candid and intimate images of her family. And through this, has found a way to look back at her own teenage years from an adult perspective.

Fitch received a BFA in Photography from Pratt Institute and an MS in Arts Administration from Boston University. She also participated in the MFA program in Photography from The School of the Arts Institute of Chicago. Her work has been exhibited internationally, including Blue Sky Gallery in Portland, OR; Center for Contemporary Art in Adeline, TX; and The Center for Photography at Woodstock, NY; and Lepont Gallery in Aleppo, Syria. Her work is also featured in various permanent collections, including at the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, TX; Worcester Art Museum in Worcester, MA; George Eastman House of Photography in Rochester, NY; Light Work; and Danforth Museum in Framingham, MA. She has received awards including sponsorships from Calumet and Kodak, a Society of Photographic Education Graduate Scholarship, and a Harper’s Bazaar National Talent Search Grand Prize. Her talents have further been recognized by Mamiya in Photo District News. She participated in Light Work’s Artist-in-Residence program in 2006.

Also on view at this time is an exhibition titled Educating Artists: Photography Programs in Review. This exhibition Light Work will host a gallery reception to celebrate these exhibitions on Thursday, April 10 from 5-8pm. Gallery hours are Sunday to Friday, 10am-6pm, and by appointment. To schedule an appointment, please call 315-443-1300. The exhibitions and reception are free and open to the public. Paid parking is available in the Marion Parking Lot and Booth Garage.

Light Work invites groups and individuals to schedule tours and gallery talks of the exhibition and facility. Light Work is a nonprofit, artist-run organization dedicated to the support of artists working in photography and electronic media. Light Work is a member of CMAC, the Coalition of Museum and Art Centers at Syracuse University. For more information about any of these exhibitions, please contact Jessica Heckman at Light Work, 315-443-1300 or jhheckma@syr.edu.

**Other press images from all exhibitions are available upon request.