Domestic I: new works by Ross McNary and Mitch Eckert
on view June 8-July 1, 2007
Opening Reception Friday June 8th, 7-11pm with a free concert by ‘Neva Geoffrey’ and ‘Dude Plays Saxophone’ begining at 8pm.
Artist Statement: Ross McNary
There are several rules that, as a photo educator, I often have to impose on my students. One of these is “Don’t photograph your kids.�? The reason for this is that I too often see photographs of cute children that have no meaning for the viewer if they don’t know the child.
As a new father, I am of course drawn to photographing my daughter, but as an artist there is still the desire to communicate an idea to the viewer. Watching her learning to see and exploring the world makes me wonder how she views things. A child’s vision changes over time, and as a visual artist this intrigues me. This work is an attempt to look through her eyes as she discovers how to see.
Artist Statement: Mitch Eckert
Things change. Everything changes when you have a family. I once spent countless hours creating new works of art that has now been replaced by the desire to spend every moment with my son and wife. I had to learn new methods of working in my studio and working in spurts of time where I once worked in solid blocks of time. One of my favorite things to do with my family is to spend a few hours playing and reading in our front room, which receives the most beautiful afternoon light.
These photographs are taken in my house during my son’s naptime. The majority of works investigate the fireplace mantel as an environment for still life. The mantel is, for the moment, out of my child’s reach and allows me to explore both the qualities of natural available light and the arrangement of objects on a daily basis. As an educator one of the many assignments I have students work on is to make self portraits or portraits of others by photographing in and around their environs. These photographs are portraits of my family.
