MID— (2013-2015)
Mid— explores a personal and cultural tension between rootedness and restlessness, set against the backdrop of my native Midwest. The large-format portrait and landscape photographs reflect a paradoxical longing to pull up stakes and put down roots, and the liminal state we often dwell in as a result. Playing on the conception of the Midwest as a transient zone to be passed through en route to somewhere else, the work refers to the pervasive belief that our greatest hopes and potentials can only be realized in some other place, at some future or past time. It’s a syndrome I’ve grappled with myself, centrifugally lapping the country in perpetual search of the impossible landing pad. As American society drifts increasingly towards untethered mobility and develops a homogenized temporary landscape in its wake, our identifications with distinct regional home places are more likely to reach mythical proportions. As such, the Midwest becomes not just my centripetal anchor, but also my stage — a metaphorical intersection between movement and stasis drawing from observation, experience, memory and fantasy. Here, my personal myth of place unfolds.
Please click on the image links below to view the portfolio of this body of work as well as documentation of exhibitions and publications.
EXHIBITIONS
2019 Divergent Paths, Suite B, Columbia, MO
2019 August Exhibit, Sager Braudis Gallery, Columbia, MO
2019 Flyover Country, Midwest Center for Photography, Wichita, KS
2018 Show-Me States, Evelyn E. Jorgenson Fine Arts Gallery, Moberly, MO
2018 Re/member/construct, Filter Space, Chicago, IL (Juror: Lisa Volpe)
2018 Highlights, Sol Koffler Gallery, Providence, RI
2018 Show-Me States, Morris Gallery of Contemporary Art, Marshall, MO
2018 Kansas City Flatfile, H&R Block Artspace, Kansas City, MO
2018 ICP Projected: Talk in Images: Body, International Center of Photography, New York, NY (Curator: Wesley Verhoeve)
2017 American Collective, Stitches and Pics, Sackets Harbor, NY (Juror: Eliot Dudik)
2017 Show-Me States, Sidney Larson Gallery, Columbia, MO (Curator: Matt Rahner)
2017 Slide Show: Elise Kirk, Archive Collective @ Front/Space, Kansas City, MO
2016 Thinking / Making / Creativity, The Kansas Board of Regents, Topeka, KS
2016 Portfolio Showcase 9, The Center for Fine Art Photography, Fort Collins, CO (Juror: Maggie Blanchard)
2016 Photography Now 2016, The Center for Photography at Woodstock, NY (Juror: James Estrin)
2016 4th International SPE Combined Caucus Exhibition, Red Rock Resort, Las Vegas, NV (Juror: Aline Smithson)
2015 Still No Mountains in the Way, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS
2015 Punctum, Photographic Center Northwest, Seattle, WA (Juror: Julia Dolan, Second Place Juror's Choice)
2015 Second Open, Peter Miller Fine Art Gallery, Providence, RI (Juror: Paula Tognarelli)
2015 Center Forward 2015, Center for Fine Art Photography, Fort Collins, CO (Juror: Hamidah Glasgow)
2015 Six Degrees, ClampArt, Chelsea, NY
2015 RISD Graduate Thesis Exhibition, Rhode Island Convention Center, Providence, RI
2014 RISD Photography Department Triennial, Woods-Gerry Gallery, Providence, RI
AWARDS & HONORS
2017 5th Annual New York Portfolio Review, Selected
2015 Lucie Foundation Emerging Artist Scholarship, Shortlist
2015 Working Artist Org, Art Purchase Award
PUBLICATIONS
2020 Booooooom
2018 Re/Member/Construct, Lisa Volpe and Jennifer Murray, Filter Photo, Exhibition Catalog
2018 Book of Thesis Books, Jennifer Liese et al, Rhode Island School of Design
2016 Lenscratch, The States Project: Kansas
2016 Center for Fine Art Photography, Portfolio Showcase 9
2016 Rabbit Rabbit: 01 Transition, Katie Harwood et al., Big Bad Bettie Press
2016 Incandescent Issue Nine, Pony Jacobson and Helen Jones, Pine Island Press
2015 Aint-Bad Magazine
2015 Lenscratch
2015 Pool Resources
2015 Center Forward 2015, Hamidah Glasgow, Center for Fine Art Photography, Exhibition Catalog
2015 We Begin When We Finish When We Begin, Jennifer Liese, Rhode Island School of Design, Graduate Studies Journal
COLLECTIONS
2015 Working Artist Org, Tacoma, WA
2015 Rhode Island School of Design, Special Collections, Providence, RI