The Aperture Foundation's two-part seminar on Strategies for Emerging Photographers began Thursday afternoon with presentations by three artists who have taken advantage of community building, grants and other opportunities in advancing their careers.
Denise Wolff, an Aperture book editor who hosted the seminar, began by noting the importance of “staying in touch with the photographic community,” especially for photographers who are trying to go from being unknown to known
At Aperture, she is more likely to review the work of an artist if she receives a recommendation from a colleague in the photo community rather than an email from an artist she’s never heard of.
Wolff said one exception is the Aperture Portfolio Prize competition, which has a July 14 deadline for submissions. For unknowns, this and other competitions can be highly useful because judges commit to reviewing everyone’s work, which means artists can get their portfolios in front of people in the industry that would be less likely to review their work normally.
Wolff then introduced the artists—Justine Reyes, Hank Willis Thomas and Brian Ulrich—each of whom had their own take on the importance of community to emerging artists.
Reyes was the first photographer to speak. She began by showing a series of still-life photographs based on Dutch vanitas paintings that incorporated personal artifacts along with those of her grandmother. She created the work during a month-long residency at the Center for Photography at Woodstock, where she received a stipend, and access to the photographic facilities and staff (for more on the Center’s program see our coverage of Part 2 of this seminar
here).
Reyes said she applies to 50 grants per year and gets maybe four of them. An
Individual Artists Initiative grant from the Queens Council on the Arts paired her with a consultant that helped her in career planning and understanding the business side of artmaking.
Through a Lower Manhattan Cultural Council artist residency program she was given a studio space. The benefits, beyond room to work, were regular visits by curators to the LMCC studios and the opportunity to build cooperative relationships with the group of artists and writers who were also residents. The LMCC program also led to her becoming a Visiting Scholar at New York University.
Continually putting herself and her work in front of grant makers, colleagues and other artists has allowed one opportunity to lead to the next for Reyes.
Hank Willis Thomas said that watching his mother, scholar and artist Deborah Willis, throughout her career taught him that “being nice to as many people as you can” was important to building a career in the arts. For example, Willis Thomas said he showed up early to see an exhibition in Miami and the only people there were Don and Mera Rubell of Rubell Family Collection and Contemporary Arts Foundation. He struck up a conversation with the Rubells and they talked for two hours, he said. That personal connection led to the Collection’s acquisition of 82 of Willis Thomas’ works.
Willis Thomas also singled out his
LightWork residency and the
Review Santa Fe portfolio reviews as important opportunities in his career. Two or three years after meeting photo editor Jody Quon at the latter, he says, he received a few assignments from Quon for
New York magazine.
Brian Ulrich began his talk by rejecting the idea that only a handful of artists can become successful. By supporting each other and building strong communities artists can navigate the psychological, financial and emotional challenges of building a career. “Having people to rely on makes all the difference,” Ulrich said.
When Ulrich was studying at Columbia College Chicago he worked as an assistant at the school’s Museum of Contemporary Photography, and access to both faculty and the museum curators helped him develop his own work. Eventually Ulrich’s portfolio was included in MOCP’s
Midwest Photographers Project rotating collection.
Ulrich also spoke about applying for and receiving a John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation fellowship. Ulrich noted that the application process for Guggenheim fellowships is purposefully vague, which requires artists who are interested in applying to seek advice from previous winners, which in turn helps build community around the awards. Ulrich said he asked Daywoud Bey about the fellowship, and Bey told him about the process and encouraged him to apply.
Related: NYPH: Advice for Emerging Photographers (And Others), Part 2
