PENUMBRA WORKSPACE PROGRAM | US | 2021
ALyssa Minahan (Boston, MA)
Alyssa Minahan’s work felt like a perfect fit for Penumbra’s WorkSpace Program. Her approach of dealing with personal experiences by challenging the notions of Photography and Sculpture is one that spoke to me. Can’t wait to see how this residency works for her.
–Maria Martinez-Cañas (Artist, Member of the 2021 Jury).
Image © Alyssa Minahan. Courtesy of the artist.
“[… ] NOTES is a visual poem on the impermanence of our lived experiences and the beauty to be found in its acceptance. Multiples of the same image - a cloud, inverted as both its positive and negative - reflect both chance and possibility. A fingerprint left on the emulsion of an unfixed lumen print acts as a witness to human presence. These unique photographic objects, with their imperfections and variability, are evidence of the only constant - change. [ …]”
Alyssa Minahan utilizes photographic materials, including unfixed gelatin silver paper and large format negatives, in non-traditional ways to express ideas integral to the medium of photography, specifically its complex relationship to time, space and memory. In September 2019, Alyssa released NOTES, a handmade photo book published by Datz Press (Seoul, South Korea). NOTES is held in the collections of The New York Public Library, International Center for Photography Library, Amon Carter Museum of American Art Research Library, Stanford University Library, California College of the Arts Library and Massachusetts College of Art and Design Morton R. Godine Library. Alyssa has exhibited her work at numerous galleries and museums, including the Datz Museum of Art (Seoul, South Korea), Center for Creative Photography (Tucson, Arizona), Pingyao International Photography Festival (Shanxi, China), Photographic Center Northwest (Seattle, Washington) and Boston University Art Galleries (Boston, Massachusetts). In addition, her work has been featured in Harper's Magazine, Art New England and Phases Magazine. Alyssa is the recipient of the 2017 Massachusetts College of Art and Design Graduate Teaching Fellowship and is currently a Lecturer of Photography in the Department of Visual and Media Arts at Emerson College (Boston, MA).
