The Portrait

EXHIBIT Closed on May 12th 2019
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Juror: Amy Holmes George

A portrait! What could be more simple and more complex, more obvious and more profound.

Juror's Choice Self Destruction © Samantha Goss

The above quotation comes not from a photographer, but from 19th century French poet (and art critic) Charles Baudelaire. It's still an accurate observation, maybe even more incisive  with the many changes in image-making that have taken place since 1859.  In the age of the selfie and ubiquitous photos of people both famous and unknown it's sometimes hard to imagine a new way of presenting a human likeness, and yet photographers are doing it.  It's said that the portrait differs from the candid (or street) photo in that the subject of the portrait knows that she or he is being photographed, and even that caveat is no longer a hard and fast rule. 

For this exhibition we asked contributors to interpret the portrait in any way they chose. It could be a self portrait, a formal portrait, a from-the-hip shot of someone whose attention was caught, or even a random body part. Manipulation of the image was permitted as long as the primary subject was from a photographic source in any medium.  Thinking, or seeing, outside the box was very much encouraged, and many of the contributors stretched the concept of the portrait to the extreme. The result is an eclectic exhibit of creative approaches to photographing people (and one rooster). 

Exhibit Calendar (Subject to Change)
Exhibit Opens:	4 April 19
Artists' Reception:	13 April 19 17:00
Exhibit Closes:	12 May 19
Submission Rules Selection Process How to make a Submission Submit your work Now Invite a Photographer The Darkroom Gallery Difference

 

Juror's Statement: "First, I would like to extend a heartfelt thanks to all the artists for sharing their personal vision in photography with me! You made my task as juror both challenging and rewarding. I was genuinely excited to discover so much diversity in approach and technique, along with rich, creative interpretations on such a traditional and timeless theme. It seems that photography, a medium of limitless possibilities, has enabled artists to refresh and also reinvent the familiar, long-standing conventions of portraiture. From quiet to compelling, simple to complex, curious to captivating—the works selected for this exhibition range widely in visual as well as conceptual exploration, conjuring stories that exist beyond the frame, surprising me over and over again with something unexpected." - Amy Holmes George, March 2019

 

 

Amy Holmes George, who lives near Dallas, Texas, is a fine art photographer and the past Executive Director of Texas Photographic Society (2013-2018). As a former tenured professor of photography and digital media at Stephen F. Austin State University, Amy has also held teaching appointments at Collin College, Baylor University and University of North Texas. Amy is a recent member of the National Board of Directors of the Society for Photographic Education (2013-2017) and a 2008 Fulbright grant recipient. She earned an MFA in photography from Clemson University and a BFA cum laude in photography and graphic design from Miami University. Exhibited widely throughout the U.S. as well as in Italy, England, France and China, Amy's work has been featured in over one hundred exhibitions and is housed in several permanent collections, including The Getty, The Kinsey Institute and the Fratelli Alinari Museum in Florence, Italy. Her work has been published in a variety of texts, including the third edition of The Book of Alternative Photographic Processes [Christopher James, 2015]; Gum Printing and other Amazing Contact Printing Processes [Christina Z. Anderson, 2013]; and the fifth edition of Exploring Color Photography: From Film to Pixels [Robert Hirsch, 2010].

 

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• All selected entries are exhibited in our gallery and included in a full color exhibit catalog.
• Juror's Choice receives a 30x48" vinyl exhibit banner featuring their image, free entry into a future exhibition, and an exhibition catalog.
  
• Honorable Mentions receive free exhibition catalogs and free entry in a future exhibition. 
  
• People's Choice gains free entry into a future exhibit.
• We offer free matting and framing of accepted entries for the duration of each of our exhibition, subject to standard sizes. Photographers set their own prices if they wish to sell their work and retain all rights to their photographs.