Photography is sometimes described as a language, a system of communication in which meaning is embedded in, and articulated by images. Just as the shape of a word is clear but its meaning complex, the same holds true for a photographic image. No matter how sharply detailed it may be, what it means is subject to interpretation. Our fascination with photography hinges on the fact that images are, after all, just images, and are surprisingly and inevitably flexible. Accomplished image-makers are those who learn to accept, work with, and even celebrate photography's inherent slipperiness.
Just as digital imaging helped dismantle assumptions about the "truth" of photography, much of the work on display questions the conventions of photographic language and genres. How has portraiture changed, for example, now that its subjects are sophisticated image-makers and image consumers themselves? What meaning might a still life still have in a culture that fosters throwaway relationships to the objects it manufactures? How have immigration, globalization, and environmental awareness altered our notions of landscape, place, and home? The work in this exhibition reflects how a newly credentialed group of visual artists has grappled with the traditions and the open-endedness of photography in an effort to say something original, personal, and consequential.

Marvin Heiferman
Curator and Faculty Member