jennifer shaw
Jennifer Shaw is a fine art photographer whose work is based on both a world observed and a world constructed, often focusing on the fleeting and personal within the sphere of her immediate surroundings. She grew up in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and earned a BFA in photography at the Rhode Island School of Design. Upon graduation she moved to New Orleans in pursuit of the artist’s life, where she currently teaches the disappearing art of darkroom photography at the Louise S. McGehee School and serves as creative director of the annual PhotoNOLA Festival.
Shaw’s photographs have been featured in B&W, American Photo, Shots, Light Leaks, The Sun, and Oxford American magazines, and online publications including NPR, Fraction Magazine, One One Thousand and Lenscratch. Her first monograph, Hurricane Story (Chin Music Press), was named a best photo book of 2011 by photo-eye and Brain Pickings. North Light Press published her second monograph, Nature/Nurture, in 2012. Shaw’s work is exhibited widely and held in collections, including the New Orleans Museum of Art, the Ogden Museum of Southern Art, and the Museum of Fine Arts Houston.
Statement
Photography is always an act of discovery for me. It’s about the joy of seeing and the mysterious convergence of light, texture and form as translated onto film. Most of my work is created using toy cameras. These simple plastic devices lend a whimsical spontaneity to the act of photographing. Although they offer little control in making exposures, their quirks can sometimes result in magic.
Recently I have begun working with photogravures, an intaglio printmaking process that dates back to the 1820’s. I approach this medium with a similar sense of play and experimentation. The plates become the negatives and still I seek that harmonic convergence of light, texture and form.
