PhotoNOLA 2020 Reviewers
Portfolio Reviewer Bios
KATE ANDERSON
Art Consultant, Boston Art
Kate has worked at Boston Art since March 2002. She spent four years as Gallery Director, recruiting both emerging and established artists of exceptional talent.
In 2007 Anderson transitioned within the firm and began working as an Art Consultant. She works as a broker between artists and corporate clients to understand their objectives, evaluate their interiors, and develop their artwork program. She facilities the acquisition of new art, fabricates licensed images, commissions custom art works and oversees final installations. Her ability to discover outstanding artistic talent and her eye for interior design have made her a leader in her field; she has placed photography in many corporate, health care, and residential art collections throughout the US.
Kate’s background as a studio artist has given her not only the expertise to knowledgably present artwork to corporate clients, but instilled within her a passion to advise artists on best practices and techniques for a professional presentation. Anderson has spoken on photography industry panels at the Griffin Museum of Photography in Winchester, Massachusetts, and at PhotoNOLA, the annual festival of photography in New Orleans, where she also served as a portfolio reviewer.
MAKEDA BEST
Curator of Photography, Harvard Art Museums
Makeda Best is the Richard L. Menschel Curator of Photography at the Harvard Art Museums. Her exhibitions include: Time is Now – Photography and Social Change in James Baldwin’s America (2018), and Crossing Lines, Constructing Home: Displacement and Belonging in Contemporary Art (2019). She has written for numerous catalogs and journals, most recently for the National Gallery of Poland, Kunsthalle Mannheim, The Archives of American Art Journal, The James Baldwin Review and the Rhode Island School of Design’s Manual. Her forthcoming book is Elevate the Masses – Alexander Gardner, Photography and Democracy in Nineteenth Century America (2020). She is co-editor of Conflict, Identity and Protest in American Art (2016).
She has performed extensive service for the field, including as a juror for CENTER Santa Fe, as a reviewer at FotoFest and PhotoNOLA. She was most recently the 2020 juror for the Annual Exhibition of the Photographic Resource Center in Boston. She serves on the board of the CASE Art Fund. She holds a graduate degree in studio photography from the California Institute of the Arts and a Ph.D. from Harvard University.
JONATHAN BLAUSTEIN
Writer and Contributor, a PhotoEditor
Jonathan Blaustein is an artist, writer, and educator based in Taos, New Mexico. He received his M.F.A. in photography from Pratt Institute in 2004, and has exhibited his work widely in galleries and museums around the US, and in festivals in Europe as well. His photographs are in the permanent collections of the Library of Congress, the State of New Mexico, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, among other institutions. Jonathan is a weekly columnist at the popular blog aPhotoEditor, and spent six years as a photo critic for the New York Times. He has also written about art and photography online for The New Yorker, VICE, The Washington Post, and Hyperallergic.
He taught photography at UNM-Taos for many years, and currently runs the Antidote Photo Retreat at his family horse farm outside Taos. Extinction Party, his first monograph, was published in March 2020 by Yoffy Press in Atlanta, and was featured in the Washington Post.
He is most interested in seeing fresh, innovative approaches to fine art and documentary photography. He is also happy to look at photojournalism, but is less knowledgeable about commercial photography.
LAURA BLEREAU
Newcomb Art Museum
Laura Blereau holds an MFA in New Forms from Pratt Institute, and a BFA in Painting from Louisiana State University. She is also an alum of the 2011 Independent Curators International workshop in performance art.
Blereau recently served as Curator at the Hilliard University Art Museum at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, where she organized a wide range of exhibitions and public programs. A specialist in art and technology, Blereau has also organized hundreds of projects with roster artists of the Bitforms Gallery, where she was a Director from 2005 to 2015. During her gallery tenure, she placed works into major museum collections and crafted strategies for the study of time-based mediums such as new media and software art, kinetic sculpture, and performance.
Her interdisciplinary approach to the visual arts has been shaped by formative work experiences at The Kitchen, Marian Goodman Gallery, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Louisiana Arts and Science Museum; as well as in the art studios of Dorothea Rockburne and Shirin Neshat. Blereau’s writing has been published in connection with exhibitions at Art Basel in Switzerland, the New Orleans Museum of Art, Fleming Museum of Art and Hilliard University Art Museum, among others. Her credits also include Associate Producer of Lynn Hershman Leeson’s 2010 documentary, !Women Art Revolution.
JOAN BROOKBANK
Joan Brookbank Projects
Joan Brookbank is a literary agent and book publishing advisor with extensive experience in the international business of books. She is the director of Joan Brookbank Projects, an agency representing and advising writers and visual artists as well as producing special projects including a traveling art exhibition. She is a former book publishing industry executive and served as the head of U.S. operations for French, British and Swiss companies, including the French book publishers’ consortium French Book Export Center [CELF] and the art book publisher Merrell.
Her experience ranges from sales, marketing, and distribution to acquisitions and project development, museum and gallery co-editions, translation rights, and book and exhibition contract drafting and negotiation. Her clients include photojournalist Bryan Shih, historian Yohuru Williams, artist Judy Chicago, writer and photographer Traer Scott, writer and photographer Arthur Drooker, photographer Peter Steinhauer, writer and illustrator Cat Willett, science illustrator Jane Kim, artist Archie Rand, writer and mathematician Aubrey Clayton, writer and illustrator Maude White, artist Jeanine Michna-Bales, artist-activist Marisa Jahn, architect-urbanist Rafi Segal, writer and illustrator Tanya Zabinski, and journalist and photographer Timothy Connor, among others.
Brookbank has placed her clients’ books with a wide range of publishers including Harper Design, Nation Books, Abrams, Penguin Random House, Hatje Cantz, Princeton Architectural Press, Glitterati, powerHouse, Columbia University Press, Scholastic, Chronicle, Thames & Hudson, and Running Press, among others.
Joan’s publishing experience ranges from literary projects to fine art books. Regarding photography, she has been involved with dozens of photography books over the years—from monographs by emerging artists and established photographers to anthologies and museum catalogs—and is open to reviewing a varied and wide spectrum of photography work. She is pleased to share insights into various publishing scenarios that may concern photographers.
Joan Brookbank on LinkedIn
DARREN CHING
Co-owner and Director, Klompching Gallery
Darren Ching is the Owner and Director of the Klompching Gallery in New York, specializing in the exhibition and sale of contemporary photography, placing artworks into private, corporate and public collections. His involvement in photography spans over two decades, including Creative Director of a photography industry publication, juror for numerous photography competitions, and has lectured and written on the subject. As an educator, he is formerly an Adjunct Faculty member at the School of Visual Arts in New York; guest critic at institutions including Rhode Island School of Design, Maryland Institute College of Art, Savannah College of Art and Design, and Parsons School of Design. Mr. Ching is also a freelance designer, specializing in photography-based projects, and is a consultant offering advice and career strategies to all levels of photographers.
He is interested in seeing exceptional bodies of work, especially those suitable for exhibition and sale within the fine art photography market—open to a wide range of subject matter and conceptual approaches. He can also give critique and advice on works-in-progress projects.
CATHERINE EDELMAN
Owner, Catherine Edelman Gallery
Catherine Edelman is the owner of Catherine Edelman Gallery, a venue for contemporary fine art photography in Chicago. Since its founding in 1987, the gallery has established itself as one of the leading galleries in the U.S. devoted to the exhibition of prominent living photographers, alongside new & young talent. The gallery showcases a broad range of subject matter, attracting both the seasoned collector and first-time buyer. Recently CEG expanded its program to include artists readings and panel discussions, with a larger exhibition space and dedicated video room, as it seeks to expand the vocabulary of photography.
In 2018, Catherine Edelman and Anette Skuggedal formed CASE Art Fund, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit that gives support and exposure to fine art photographers whose projects focus on humanitarian issues and create a positive impact on social awareness, human rights, and education. CASE’s vision is to be at the forefront of presenting photographs about social injustices that inspire, educate, raise awareness and offer dialogue.
Edelman is interested in reviewing socially relevant work, and is not interested in nudes, flowers or straightforward architecture.
JON FEINSTEIN
Co-Founder, Humble Arts Foundation; Content Director, The Luupe
Jon Feinstein is a Seattle and New York City-based curator, photographer, co-founder of Humble Arts Foundation, and Content Director at The Luupe, a new platform connecting women and non-binary photographers with leading brands. Jon has curated numerous exhibitions over the past fifteen years, including Blue Sky’s curatorial prize exhibition, An Inward Gaze, with Roula Seikaly, and Currents at PhotoNOLA 2019. His projects have been featured in Aperture, The New York Times, The New Republic, BBC, VICE, The New Yorker, Hyperallergic, Feature Shoot, and American Photo, and his writing has appeared in VICE, Hyperallergic, Aperture, Photograph, Adobe’s blog, TIME, Slate, Daylight, and PDN.
He is open to seeing a wide range of work, but prefers NOT to see male-gazey portraits of women by male photographers.
LARRY GAWEL
Professor of Photography and Photography Program Coordinator, Metropolitan Community College, Omaha
Larry Gawel is a Professor of Photography and the Photography Program Coordinator at Metropolitan Community College in Omaha, Nebraska. He received a B.F.A. from Edinboro University of Pennsylvania in 1991 and an M.F.A. from the Pennsylvania State University in 1994, both with concentrations in photography.
His work has been exhibited in numerous venues, including: the Southeast Museum of Photography, the Sheldon Museum of Art, the Toyota Municipal Museum of Art, Pittsburgh Filmmakers, the Lux Center for the Arts, the Kimmel Harding Nelson Center for the Arts, Truman State University, and College of St. Mary. In 2013 he was selected as an artist with the Lincoln Arts Council’s CSArt program for which he produced tintypes of the various plants and animals that he harvests from the land.
In 2008 Mr. Gawel and his wife, Dana Fritz, opened WorkSpace Gallery, a gallery exhibiting work by contemporary photographers who explore the photographic medium through notions of its past, present, and future. From 2012-2019, he served as Chairperson of the Society for Photographic Education’s Midwest Region.
HAMIDAH GLASGOW
Executive Director and Curator, The Center for Fine Art Photography; Co-founder of the Strange Fire Collective
Hamidah Glasgow has been the Executive Director and Curator at The Center for Fine Art Photography in Fort Collins, Colorado, since 2009. Hamidah holds a master’s degree in humanities with a specialization in visual and gender studies and a bachelor’s degree in philosophy. Hamidah’s contribution to photography has included curatorial projects, national portfolio reviews (FotoFest, Photolucida, Medium, Center, Filter, etc.), contributions to publications, and online magazines. In 2018, Hamidah received the Hal Gould Vision in Photography Award.
Hamidah is a co-founder of the Strange Fire Collective. The Strange Fire Collective is a group of interdisciplinary artists, curators, and writers focused on work that engages with current social and political forces. We seek to create a venue for work that critically questions the dominant social hierarchy and are dedicated to highlighting work made by women, people of color, and queer and trans artists. (Pronounced Ha-me-dah)
She is interested in reviewing work that is addressing pressing issues in society, and less interested in traditional nudes or traditional landscapes.
GREGORY HARRIS
Associate Curator of Photography, High Museum of Art, Atlanta
Gregory Harris is the Associate Curator of Photography at the High Museum of Art in Atlanta. He is a specialist in contemporary photography with a particular interest in documentary practice. Since joining the High in 2016, Harris has curated over a dozen exhibitions, including Way Out There: The Art of Southern Backroads and Look Again: 40 Years of Collecting Photographs, as well as solo shows with Thomas Struth, Paul Graham, and Amy Elkins.
He recently led the expansion and installation of the High’s new photography galleries. Before joining the High, Harris was the Assistant Curator at the DePaul Art Museum in Chicago. He previously held curatorial positions in the Photography Department at the Art Institute of Chicago. Harris has also contributed essays to monographs by Matthew Brandt, Paul D’Amato, Amy Elkins, Jill Frank, and the Metabolic Studio. In addition to his curatorial work, Harris is a member of the Advisory Council of Atlanta Celebrates Photography. He earned a B.F.A. in photography from Columbia College Chicago, and an M.A. in art history from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
He is interested in seeing all kinds of fine art and documentary projects in any stage of development, but particularly likes to see projects that are still in progress. He is less interested in fashion, commercial, and editorial work.
EDWARD (EDDIE) HEBERT
Fine Art Consultant, New Orleans
A native of New Orleans, Edward Hebert has been active in the New Orleans’ art community for over twenty-eight years. Hebert’s educational background is in photography, painting, and sociology. After attending The New Orleans Center for Creative Arts from 1977 to 1980, he earned a B.A. in Fine Arts from the University of New Orleans in 1986, and continues to study the history of photography, art history, painting, and drawing.
Hebert served as director of A Gallery for Fine Photography in New Orleans from 1993 to 2020 where he curated exhibitions and sold photography in New Orleans, as well as in art fairs in New York, Basel, Switzerland, and Paris, France. In addition, he oversaw inventory acquisition, conservation, framing to museum standards, and website maintenance.
Currently, he is a dealer and consulting agent for photography and painting.
BENJAMIN HICKEY
Hilliard Museum
Benjamin M. Hickey is Curator of Exhibitions at the Paul and Lulu Hilliard University Art Museum, University of Louisiana at Lafayette. Most central to his curatorial practice are projects that blend social history, sense of place, and interdisciplinary collaborations. Artists with whom he has worked include Lionel Cruet, Shayne Dark, Jenny Ellerbe, Hasan Elahi, Robert Hodge, Beili Liu, Kelli Scott Kelley, Vitus Shell, Marni Shindelman & Nate Larson, James Surls, and Alberto Rey.
Hickey was most recently the Curator of Collections and Exhibitions at the Masur Museum of Art in Monroe, LA. Other institutions at which he held positions include the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY; California Museum of Photography, Riverside, CA; Arts Council in Buffalo and Erie County, Buffalo, NY; and OUTSIDE GALLERY, Monroe, LA. He also worked as an Adjunct Professor at Canisius College, Buffalo, NY and Louisiana Tech University, Ruston, LA. With reference to service, he was a long standing Community Advisory Board member for KEDM, NPR’s Monroe, LA affiliate, and is currently a Trustee at Large for the Association of Art Museum Curators. Hickey earned his Master’s in the History of Art from the University of California, Riverside.
SAMANTHA JOHNSTON
Executive Director and Curator, Colorado Photographic Arts Center
Samantha Johnston has been the Executive Director and Curator at the Colorado Photographic Arts Center in Denver since 2015. She holds a certificate in Arts Development and Program Management from the University of Denver, an M.F.A. from Lesley University College of Art and Design, and a B.F.A. from Alfred University.
Prior to joining CPAC, she taught photography and visual arts for 12 years at high schools in Boston and Denver.
She has curated exhibitions with contemporary artists such as Jess T. Dugan, Daniel Coburn, Barbara Ciurej & Lindsay Lochman, and Zora Murff. Samantha has served as a reviewer at Houston FotoFest, Review Santa Fe, PhotoPlus New York, Medium, Month of Photography Denver (MoP), Filter, and Photolucida. She has juried several exhibitions, including Critical Mass and The Fence.
Samantha is interested in viewing a wide variety of work including non-traditional photo based projects. She is also interested in works in progress, finished projects and is open to discussion about editing, sequencing, and project development. She is looking for photo-based artists for solo and group exhibition opportunities at CPAC’s gallery.
MICHAEL KIRCHOFF
Editor, Analog Forever Magazine; Founding Editor, Catalyst: Interviews
Michael Kirchoff is a photographic artist, Founding Editor at Catalyst: Interviews, Editor in Chief at Analog Forever Magazine, and Contributing Editor for the column, Traverse, at One Twelve Publishing. Based in Los Angeles, Michael conducts artist interviews, presents features, and curates fine art photography bodies of work from emerging and mid-career photographic artists worldwide for all entities. Previously, Michael also served as Editor at BLUR Magazine from 2014-2018.
In addition, Michael is an independent curator and juror for a number of organizations and galleries around in the U.S., including Photolucida’s Critical Mass. During his ten years on the Board of Directors (2006-2016) at the American Photographic Artists L.A. Chapter (APA/LA), his guidance produced events and artist lectures for commercial and fine art photographers alike. His consulting, training, and overall support of his fellow photographic artists continues with assistance in constructing one’s vision, reviewing portfolios, and finding exhibition opportunities.
Michael seeks portfolios that demonstrate a cohesive and thoughtfully edited body of work with an emphasis on the creative, either stylistically or thematically. Film based and analog process work are of particular interest for fine art and documentary photography.
SARAH LEEN
Founder and Editor, the Visual Thinking Collective
In 2013 Sarah Leen became the first female Director of Photography at the National Geographic Partners, leaving in 2019 to launch the Visual Thinking Collective for independent women visual professionals who support our photographic community by editing, teaching, curating, and project management. For nearly 20 years she worked as a freelance photographer for the National Geographic magazine until 2004, when she joined the magazine staff as a Senior Photo Editor. As a photographer
Leen published sixteen stories and produced six covers for the National Geographic magazine.
She has juried numerous contests and portfolio reviews for Pictures of the Year International, LensCulture, Critical Mass, Photo Lucida, The FotoEvidence Book Award, the Carmignac Award, the W. Eugene Smith Grants, the Getty Images Editorial Grants, the New York Times Portfolio Reviews and the World Press Joop Swarts Masterclass.
Leen works individually with photographers and agencies editing long term projects and books, including the America, Again project by the VII Photo agency published on Medium and the 2020 FotoEvidence World Press Photo Book Award winner book, HABIBI, by Antonio Faccilongo.
Leen believes in sharing her knowledge through mentoring and teaching photography and photo editing workshops at the Missouri Photo Workshop, the Maine Media Workshops, Santa Fe Photographic Workshops, the Eddie Adams Workshop, and the PhotoLux Festival in Lucca, Italy.
DOUGLAS MARSHALL
Owner & Director, Marshall Contemporary
Douglas Marshall is an LA-based independent curator and consultant at Marshall Contemporary. Marshall was formerly Director at Peter Fetterman Gallery, Santa Monica from 2012-2017, producing over 50 exhibitions and art fairs dedicated to leading photographers across the history of the medium with a focus on humanism, landscape, pictorialism, and street genres. Through his current roles in the field, Marshall now works to bring emerging and innovative international voices in contemporary photography to the American market through collaborative projects with artists, galleries, and fairs.
Marshall is seeking works and projects that are process-driven and show a strong, innovative approach to technical craftsmanship and printmaking through creative uses of alternative processes, unique papers and sculptural approaches to the medium. Additionally, he is open to reviewing documentary, narrative and abstract work. He is not interested in seeing fashion, editorial, commercial and stock photography.
ADAM MONOHON
Center for Creative Photography
Adam Monohon is a passionate scholar and curator of photography, committed to promoting accessibility and equity in the cultural heritage sector. He is deeply interested in the history of photography, as well as modern and contemporary non-Western art; he is especially interested in modern and contemporary East Asian photography, having completed his graduate and undergraduate theses on the topic. In addition, he is interested in American photography as it relates to feminism, queer theory, photographic materiality, and the agency of East Asian cultural frameworks and actors.
As a member of the curatorial team at the Center for Creative Photography (CCP) Monohon has curated Edward Weston’s Leaves of Grass and the forthcoming exhibition Photographs as Letters. He has assisted in organizing Mexican Photographers, Mexican Views (2018), Richard Avedon: Relationships (2018), and The Qualities of LIGHT: The Story of a Pioneering New York City Photography Gallery (2019), among other exhibitions at the CCP. During his time as Graduate Curatorial Intern in the Photographs Department at the J. Paul Getty Museum Monohon helped to organize Icons of Style: A Century of Fashion Photography (2018) and Paper Promises: Early American Photography (2018).
He is a graduate of the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London’s MA History of Art and Archaeology of East Asia program and Pratt Institute’s BA History of Art and Design program. A recipient of a SOAS Master’s Scholarship for Arts and Humanities and a Critical Language Scholarship for Chinese from the U.S. Department of State, he has spent the past years living between his home, in Washington State, New York, London, Los Angeles, China, and Tucson, Arizona.
JENNIFER MURRAY
Executive Director, Filter Photo Festival
Jennifer Murray is the executive director of Filter Photo, where she directs the planning of Filter Photo Festival as well as programming at Filter Space gallery in Chicago. She was director of Averill and Bernard Leviton A+D Gallery at Columbia College Chicago for eleven years, where she organized a broad range of exhibitions in art and design. She is an independent curator and educator teaching a broad range of topics from darkroom and digital skills to portfolio development and professional practices for emerging photographers. She is an instructor of photography at Loyola University Chicago and an artists’ consultant and mentor working with artists on project development and exhibition preparation.
Murray is a frequent portfolio reviewer and juror at photography events across the U.S., including FotoFest, Photolucida’s Critical Mass, SPE, and Filter Photo. She received an M.F.A. in photography from Columbia College Chicago in 2002.
KSENIA NOURIL
Jensen Bryan Curator, The Print Center
Ksenia is the Jensen Bryan Curator at The Print Center, a 105-year-old nonprofit institution in Philadelphia dedicated to expanding the understanding of photography and printmaking as vital contemporary arts. A specialist in global contemporary photography, Ksenia previously held a Contemporary and Modern Art Perspectives (C-MAP) fellowship in the Department of Photography at The Museum of Modern Art, New York. She has organized exhibitions at the Bruce Museum, Lower East Side Printshop, MoMA, and Zimmerli Art Museum.
Ksenia lectures widely and frequently writes for international exhibition catalogues, magazines, and academic journals, including ARTMargins Online, The Calvert Journal, Institute of the Present, OSMOS, and Woman’s Art Journal. She has published two books: Art and Theory of Post-1989 Central and Eastern Europe: A Critical Anthology (co-editor and contributor, MoMA, 2018), and Ilya Kabakov and Viktor Pivovarov: Stories About Ourselves (editor and contributor, Rutgers University Press, 2019).
Ksenia holds a B.A. in Art History and Slavic Studies from New York University and an M.A. and Ph.D. in Art History from Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey.
She is interested in seeing any and all work – though, she personally favors work that is more narrative driven (i.e. historical or personal stories) by artists from diverse backgrounds.
SASHA PATKIN
Harvard Business Review
Sasha Patkin is a writer, photographer, photo editor, educator, Carrollian scholar, and occasional musician.
She studied photography and literature at Bard College and Georgetown University and has worked for magazines and media outlets such as People, Harvard Business Review, The Village Voice, LensCulture, and The New York Photography Diary.
Her photographs and writings on art and culture have appeared in The Village Voice, The New York Photography Diary, Mic, ArtObserved, The Dovetail Journal, and Young Shot, and she has taught teen courses at The International Center of Photography, The School of Creative and Performing Arts in New York City, and Georgetown University Summer Programs. She spends her free time commuting.
BRIAN PIPER
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Assistant Curator of Photography, New Orleans Museum of Art
Brian Piper is the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Assistant Curator of Photography at the New Orleans Museum of Art. He completed his Ph.D. in American Studies at the College of William and Mary in 2016, with the assistance of fellowships from the Smithsonian Institution and Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture. His research focuses on 20th century African American photography, vernacular uses of photographs, and histories of race and photography.
Prior to his arrival in New Orleans, Piper held a variety of teaching and curatorial positions at the College of William and Mary, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, and Valentine Richmond History Center. At NOMA, his curatorial credits include: You Are Here: A Brief History of Photography and Place (2019), Lee Friedlander in Louisiana (2018), Beyond the Frame: Photography and Native American Lives (2017), and the multi-media exhibition Changing Course: Reflections on New Orleans Histories (2018).
He is currently developing an exhibition about the work of African American studio photographers during the Long Civil Rights Movement.
ROULA SEIKALY
Senior Editor, Humble Arts Foundation and Independent Curator and Writer
Roula Seikaly is an independent curator and writer based in Berkeley, and Senior Editor at Humble Arts Foundation. Her curatorial practice addresses contemporary photography and new media, social justice efforts in contemporary art, exhibition making, and institutional critique. Her writing is published virtually and in print on platforms including Hyperallergic, Photograph, BOMB Magazine, and KQED Arts. She has curated exhibitions at the Utah Museum of Fine Arts, SOMArts, SF Camerawork, Blue Sky Gallery, and Colorado Photographic Arts Center.
Seikaly is interested in seeing projects by emerging and early career artists (high school, B.F.A. and M.F.A. candidates, artists working outside institutional contexts) that demonstrate strong conceptual and aesthetic foundations. Narrative, documentary, process- and research-based projects are all of interest, while commercial, stock, nude, still life, and traditional landscapes are not. As a representative of Humble Arts Foundation (HAF), she is looking for projects that we may highlight through artist interviews, exhibitions, and publication reviews.
ALINE SMITHSON
Lenscratch
Aline Smithson is a visual artist, educator, and editor based in Los Angeles, California. Best known for her conceptual portraiture and a practice that uses humor and pathos to explore the performative potential of photography. Growing up in the shadow of Hollywood, her work is influenced by the elevated unreal. She received a BA in art from the University of California at Santa Barbara and was accepted into the College of Creative Studies, studying under artists such as William Wegman, Allen Ruppersburg, and Charles Garabian. After a decade-long career as a New York Fashion Editor, Aline returned to Los Angeles and to her own artistic practice.
She has exhibited widely including over 40 solo shows at institutions such as the Griffin Museum of Photography,the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, the Fort Collins Museum of Contemporary Art, the San Jose Art Museum, the Shanghai, Lishui, and Pingyqo Festivals in China, The Rayko Photo Center in San Francisco, the Center of Fine Art Photography in Colorado, the Tagomago Gallery in Barcelona and Paris, and the Verve Gallery in Santa Fe. In addition, her work is held in a number of public collections and her photographs have been featured in publications including The New York Times, The New Yorker, PDN, Communication Arts, Eyemazing, Real Simple, Los Angeles, Visura, Shots, Pozytyw, and Silvershotz magazines.
In 2007, Aline founded LENSCRATCH, a photography journal that celebrates a different contemporary photographer each day. She has been the Gallery Editor for Light Leaks Magazine, a contributing writer for Diffusion, Don’t Take Pictures, Lucida, and F Stop Magazines, has written book reviews for photo-eye, and has provided the forewords for artist’s books by Tom Chambers, Meg Griffiths, Flash Forward 12, Robert Rutoed, Nancy Baron, among others. Aline has curated and jurored exhibitions for a number of galleries, organizations, and on-line magazines, including Review Santa Fe, Critical Mass, Flash Forward, and the Griffin Museum. In addition, she is a reviewer and educator at many photo festivals across the United States. Aline has been teaching at the Los Angeles Center of Photography since 2001.
MARY VIRGINIA SWANSON
MVS and Associates
MARY VIRGINIA SWANSON is an educator, author and entrepreneur in the field of photography, and a respected advisor to artists and arts organizations. Unique in our field, her broad background includes exhibiting, collecting, licensing and marketing photographs and affords her a range of perspectives on making and marketing art. Ms. Swanson counts among her consulting clients a range of internationally respected artists and institutions.
Swanson received her MFA in Photography from Arizona State University (1979). Throughout graduate school she served as a research assistant for the Curator of Photography at the Minneapolis Institute of Art, her hometown Museum. She began her career at The Friends of Photography in Carmel, California, managing the education offerings including Ansel Adams Workshop. From there she moved to NYC to head Special Projects at Magnum Photos, bringing the work of their photographers to broader audiences through exhibition and publication projects. She relocated to Tucson, Arizona in 1990 to launch Swanstock, a unique agency managing licensing rights for fine art photographers.
She currently works independently, offering consulting services to artists and arts organizations, and offering her own classes and giving back to our field through educational seminars, serving as an advisor for multiple not-for-profit industry organizations, and other community-minded activities.
BARBARA TANNENBAUM
Chair, Prints, Drawings, and Photographs, and Curator of Photography, Cleveland Museum of Art
Barbara Tannenbaum has organized over 125 exhibitions during her four-decade career as a curator. Recent exhibitions include Bruce Davidson: Brooklyn Gang; Ilse Bing: Queen of the Leica; Signal Noise: Photographs by Aaron Rothman; Black in America: Louis Draper and Leonard Freed; Cheating Death: Portrait Photography’s First Half Century; and DIY: Photographers and Books, which was the first museum show of print-on-demand photobooks. She co-organized the first large-scale international exhibition chronicling women’s historic achievements in fine art photography and the 1991 Ralph Eugene Meatyard retrospective.
Dr. Tannenbaum has authored numerous publications, including books on Ralph Eugene Meatyard, T.R. Ericsson, and the Akron Art Museum’s collection, and lectured throughout the U.S. and in Canada, Brazil, and China.
Dr. Tannenbaum has (hopefully sage) advice and guidance to offer and looks forward to discussing exhibition and book projects still in their development phase. She is interested in seeing many different kinds of work, but prefers not to review photography that is primarily commercial in nature. Nudity is okay as long as it is truly at the service of artistic expression.
PAULA TOGNARELLI
Executive Director and Curator, Griffin Museum of Photography
Paula Tognarelli is the Executive Director and Curator of the Griffin Museum of Photography, located in Winchester (outside Boston), Massachusetts. The Griffin Museum of Photography is a nonprofit whose mission is to promote an appreciation of photographic art and a broader understanding of its visual, emotional and social impact. She has held positions at the museum since 2002.
Ms. Tognarelli is responsible for producing more than 54 exhibitions a year at the Griffin and its surrounding satellite spaces. She holds an M.S. in Arts Administration from Boston University, a B.A. from Regis College, is a graduate of the New England School of Photography, and was a candidate for Master of Education at Lesley University. Prior to her career as an arts administrator she spent 25 years in the printing industry. She was named one of 12 women in the United States who contributed to moving the industry from an analog workflow to a completely digital process.
She has juried and curated exhibitions internationally, is a regular participant in national and local portfolio reviews, has been a panelist and featured speaker at photography events and conferences including MacWorld. She has been a panelist for the Massachusetts Cultural Council’s Photography Fellowships, and is a nominator for the Prix Pictet in Geneva, Switzerland, a nominator for the Heinz Prize in Pennsylvania, the Robert Gardner Fellowship at Harvard University, St. Botolph Club Foundation, MOPA Triennial, and the Rappaport Prize in Massachusetts. She is a past member of the Xerox Technical Advisory Board, Rotary and Winchester Multicultural Network.
Ms. Tognarelli is open to viewing a broad range of photography, but will be looking for completed bodies of work that are ready for exhibition. She is also interested in work that can be connected to programming and education projects. Ms. Tognarelli approaches portfolio reviews from the perspective of an educator offering assessment and guidance to photographers to realize their objectives.
LISA VOLPE
Associate Curator of Photography, Museum of Fine Arts, Houston
Lisa Volpe is the Associate Curator of Photography at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. She earned her M.A. at Case Western Reserve University and her Ph.D. at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Before arriving in Houston, she was the Curator of the Wichita Art Museum where she oversaw all areas of the museum’s collection. Additionally, she held various curatorial roles at the Santa Barbara Museum of Art, and fellowships at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Cleveland Museum of Art.
Her current project, Georgia O’Keeffe: Photographer, examines the little-known trove of artistic photographs created by O’Keeffe in the latter half of her career.
LEAH WOODRUFF
Independent Photo Editor, previously Outside Magazine
Leah is an independent photo editor who previously worked as the photo editor of Outside Magazine in Santa Fe, N.M., where she commissioned photography and produced photo shoots for print content. There, she worked alongside photographers including Joe Pugliese, Randi Berez, Andrew Hetherington, Amy Harrity, Peter Prato, and others. Before Outside Magazine, she spent two years as the studio coordinator at Santa Fe Photographic Workshops, where she produced shoots, assisted photography instructors, and taught studio lighting. After graduating from the Ohio University School of Visual Communication, Leah worked in New York as an intern for Sarah Silver, where she learned the intricacies of New York fashion photography.
Her personal work is based in portraiture/fashion as well as travel, and she is most interested in reviewing portraiture, storytelling/documentary work, and fashion photography.
JANE YEOMANS
Photo Editor, Bloomberg Businessweek Magazine
Jane Yeomans currently works at Bloomberg Businessweek magazine, where she commissions and licenses photography.
Previously she worked as freelance photo editor and researcher for book projects, design firms and for many publications, including The New Yorker, New York Magazine, Vanity Fair, ESPN and many others. She has been commissioning and licensing photography for many years in New York City, where she currently resides.
JENNIFER YOFFY
Founder and Publisher, Yoffy Press
Jennifer Yoffy is a publisher, photographer, and arts advocate based in Atlanta, Georgia. She is the founder/publisher of Yoffy Press, an independent publisher dedicated to pushing the boundaries of photobook publishing. She was the creator/director of Crusade for Art, a non-profit organization focused on cultivating demand for art, and the owner of Jennifer Schwartz Gallery, a fine art gallery that showcased the work of emerging photographers. She also created the online project, The Ten, and was the co-creator of Flash Powder Projects, a photographer-focused collaborative venture and publishing company. In the spring of 2013, she traveled around the country in a 1977 VW bus, engaging audiences with photography. Her book, Crusade for Your Art: Best Practices for Fine Art Photographers was published in 2014. The follow-up publication, Crusade for Your Audience: Finding and Cultivating Art Collectors, was released in 2017.
She is open to reviewing all types of work, but ideally would like to see projects that have a conceptual foundation and could potentially be a fit for publication in book form.
