ENTERTAINMENT

Largest Louisville Photo Biennial kicks off

Elizabeth Kramer
@arts_bureau

“Decades ago, the Center for Photographic Studies was in full blast and it put photography and Louisville on the map for many artists,” said Mary Carothers, an artist and University of Louisville associate art professor.

Carothers wasn’t in Louisville when the school operated from 1970-78, but she’s traveled the country and heard about it.

Now, she and other artists and photography enthusiasts see this year’s Louisville Photo Biennial as an event — with more than 65 exhibits, talks and workshops in the region throughout October — set to emulate the glory that was associated between the city and the medium.

The magnitude of this year’s biennial, the 10th since 1999, has been building momentum since it was initiated by four galleries on East Market Street — Swanson Contemporary, Galerie Hertz (now in the Shelby Park neighborhood), Zephyr Gallery and Erin Divine Gallery (a predecessor of Pyro Gallery). Through much of its life, attorney and photography collector Paul Paletti has shepherded the organization of events every two years.

This year’s biennial, Paletti noted, has exhibits and events spanning north to south from Sellersberg, Ind., to Lexington, Ky., and east to west from Madison to Elizabeth, Ind.

Paletti credited this year’s expanded biennial to more formal organization behind the festival with galleries paying modest participation fees and a $13,500 grant from the city to help fund coordinators and educators. He pointed to this year’s easily navigable website where all the events’ locations, times and other details are listed.

Events also include several photography workshops that teach different processes as well as classes for youth at the California Community Center, the Baxter Community Center, the Shawnee Arts and Cultural Center, the Molly Leonard Portland Community Center and Metro Arts Center.

In addition, the University of Louisville Hite Art Institute marshaled resources to raise $35,000 to support hosting the Society for Photographic Education’s four-day Midwest regional conference in Louisville, starting Friday, Oct. 1. The conference is bringing noted artists as well as scholars to speak, including James Rhem, who has written two books on the late pioneering photographer Ralph Eugene Meatyard of Lexington and Brian Sholis, curator of photography at the Cincinnati Art Museum.

Paletti called the quality of artists coming for the conference, whose work also will be shown by U of L, a major contribution to the biennial. They include conference’s keynote speaker, Abelardo Morell, the internationally recognized Cuban-born and Boston-based artist who creates images using a primitive optical device called a camera obscura and in 2013 had a retrospective of his works shown at the Art Institute of Chicago.

Morell’s work is being shown at U of L’s Cressman Center in the exhibit “Throwing Light, Catching Shadows” along with other noted artists including Dan Estabrook, who uses 19th century techniques to produce his work, and Lori Nix, who constructs highly detailed miniature worlds that she then photographs. (Work by Nix also is showing at Spalding University’s Huff Gallery and Kentucky College of Art and Design, formerly Kentucky School of Art).

Carothers worked with fellow U of L associate art professor Mitch Eckert to organize the conference, which is expected to bring more than 200 people to Louisville and has secured support from Bellarmine University, Indiana University Southeast, and Kentucky School of Art and Design at Spalding University to bring in four of the eight speakers. Those schools also have exhibits in their own gallery spaces by artists associated with the conference as well as regional photographers. In conjunction with the conference, Carothers has worked with her students and teachers at other schools who will mount a special projection event at Fourth Street Live on Oct. 1.

Paletti has lined up a show at his own Paul Paletti Gallery of work by English photographer Michael Kenna, known for his black and white images of landscapes usually taken at dawn or at night using long exposure times. The exhibit includes works from his recently released book “Forms of Japan,” which features 240 images taken over nearly 30 years.

The mention of Kenna’s name set C.J. Pressma, founder of the Center for Photographic Studies, to talking about his work and the high-quality photography of others artist in this biennial.

“I think the general public’s perception of photography is pretty old fashioned and there’s so much more going on these days than the standard photograph that reflects an image of reality,” Pressma said.

The show “Photography Since the Millennium” that Pressma curated for New Albany’s Carnegie Center for Art and History reflects advanced ideas about photography. He chose work by artists he has known, including former U of L faculty Susan Mitchell who rarely shows her work anymore, as well as work by artists referred to Pressma. Other artists with work in the show include Pressma, Carothers, Eckert, Keith Auerbach, Tiffany Carbonneau, Julius Friedman, Laura Hartford, Tom LeGoff and Arturo Alonzo Sandoval.

Visitors to many of the exhibits will notice some artists show up in more than one show.

Carothers and Eckert also have work at Galerie Hertz along with artists Richard Bram, Bob Hower, John Nation and others. Eckert also has work in an exhibit “Natural Beauty” at The Green Building Gallery with Nori Hall, whose work in landscapes also appears in “Maps of Imagination: Kentucky Women Photographers Network" at Actors Theatre Gallery, Bernheim Arboretum and Research Forest's "Fresher Air: Selections from the Bernheim Artist in Residency Program,” and “New Alchemy” at Georgetown College Fine Art Galleries in central Kentucky.

Portraits come into frame in several exhibits including those of musicians in “The Art of Rock: Transcending Sound" at Copper & Kings curated by Mary Helen Yates and the self-portraits of highly imaginative work of Nina Katchadourian, who was a featured artist at April’s Venice Biennale and has work in The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Indianapolis Museum of Art. (Katchadourian's witty still photos of books are in a Kentucky Museum of Art and Craft show at the Louisville library's southwest branch.)

Of course, the Kentucky Derby gets a nod in a few shows, including The Courier-Journal’s “Historical Photography of The Kentucky Derby” and "Stars of the Stands" at Kentucky Derby Museum.

Commercial photography gets wall space in the Frazier History Museum's "Power of Persuasion — 100 Years of Doe-Anderson."

While the exhibits mentioned here just scratch the surface, the breadth of the biennial provides a nearby venue for nearly anyone in the region to visit. Organizers said even though there is likely too much to be able to see everything, the effort and the quality of the work continues to put Louisville on the map.

Reach reporter Elizabeth Kramer at (502) 582-4682 and ekramer@courier-journal.com. Follow her on Twitter @arts_bureau and on Facebook at Elizabeth Kramer - Arts Writer.

IF YOU GO

What: Louisville Photo Biennial 2015. More than 65 exhibits that include a wide variety of photography as well as workshops and special events.

When: Sept. 25-Nov. 7

Where: In galleries, schools, community centers and other locations through Louisville, southern Indiana and central Kentucky.

Cost: The majority of events are free

Information: For a listing including exhibits and lectures with locations and contact information for each, visit louisvillephotobiennial.com and www.facebook.com/LouisvillePhoto. On Twitter @PhotoBiennialKy.

A FEW SPECIAL EVENTS

Society for Photographic Education, Midwest Regional Conference: 6 p.m. Oct. 1-4, The Seelbach Hilton 500 S. 4th St. Keynote address by Abelardo Morell in the Medallion Ballroom. For more information on the conference, visit www.spenational.org.

Student Public Art Project: Friday, Oct. 2, dusk until midnight, Fourth Street Live. A project by students from University of Louisville, Indiana University Southeast and Kentucky College of Art and Design at Spalding University containing images reflecting civil rights and social activism projected in large form onto a 1960s styled frame reflecting a television set from the era. The projects are intended to complement the Civil Rights Trail of historical markers downtown that provide information about the 1960s sit-in demonstrations that occurred in the area.