OCTOBER, 2021 - MARCH, 2022

"Portfolio Platform" provides the focus of a streamlined online presence, providing the opportunity for photographers to showcase portfolios of photographic work prominently online. The portfolios are available for patrons of the gallery to view online, learn about the photographers and their work through the images, biographies and artist statements, and have the opportunity to purchase photographs. These eleven featured artists are represented with each portfolio consistsing of 12 - 20 images.

PORTFOLIO PLATFORM - 2021/2022

FEATURED ARTISTS:

Marilyn Crocker, Evanston, IL;

Kristine Hinrichs, Milwaukee, WI;

Daniel McInnis, Perrysburg, OH;

Susan Richman, Hastings on Hudson, NY;

Kathryn Rodrigues, Park Ridge, IL;

Lev Spiro, Beverly Hills, CA.

Marilyn Crocker

"Where Water Meets Land"

Rising early in the morning before others stir, Marilyn is drawn out of the cottage and down the path to the lake. The mist rises from the water obscuring much of the land, and no sound disturbs the quiet. This is a moment of deep connection to “the water” which has always been a part of her, and has been passed down through generations from her great grandparents. This northern lake with its rocky shores has become Marilyn's homeplace, the place she returns to each summer, and where her love of water began. The experience of the lake is intertwined with family memories and appreciation for its captivating beauty which brings contemplation and contentment.  

Over the years the water has continued to exert a strong pull on Marilyn wherever she is, whether on the lakefront of a Great Lake near home, on the banks of a stream or pond, or along the shores of a lake in the woods. Water beckons her to explore its relationship to the land and how each influences the other. Reflections of the land on water and the way light on the water changes with the time of day, weather and season inspire her observation and creation of photographic images.

Marilyn Crocker first became aware of photography as a child viewing family photos taken by her father in slideshows in a darkened living room and by exploring the photographs in Life Magazine. She began creating her own photographic images by taking snapshots on a Kodak Instamatic camera over 50 years ago. After purchasing an SLR she took her first photography course from Vandell Cobb, Ebony Magazine photographer, at the Evanston Art Center in Evanston, IL. This experience inspired her to begin developing black and white photographs in her own pantry darkroom. While maintaining her interest in photography Marilyn spent 34 stimulating and challenging years as an elementary school teacher and school librarian. Photography had a way of entering her world of work whether it was teaching photography to kids or photographing them. She has spent many memorable summers of her life on lakes in Canada and Michigan at family cottages which has led her to nature photography as her primary focus. Wherever she is, closely observing her surroundings has been a constant in her life. She observes the light and shadows, the shape and form of things, the colors, the textures, and how it all works together to create a visual image. She believes her early days in the darkroom led to her affinity for black and white photography. When Marilyn retired from teaching she vowed to make photography her main creative endeavor. As a lifelong learner it was natural for her to begin taking photography courses again.  

Marilyn Crocker received the Focus on Photography Certificate at the Chicago Botanic Garden. In 2017 she had a one woman show Seeing in Black and White in the gallery at Curt’s Café in Evanston, Illinois. She has had works published in National Louis University’s LifeLong Learning publication The LLI Review. She became a member of the Chicago Photographic Arts Society and has been a part of the society’s exhibitions. Marilyn’s photographs have also been exhibited at Chicago botanic Garden, Glencoe, Illinois; Blank Wall Gallery, Athens, Greece; Midwest Center for Photography, Wichita, Kansas; City hall, Highland Park, Illinois; PhotoPlace Online Gallery, Vermont; Ely Center, New Haven, Connecticut and Praxis Gallery, Minneapolis, MN.

All images in the portfolio are Digital Inkjet Prints.

Daniel McInnis

"Shozo-Ga (Tokyo Portraits)"

In 2019, Daniel had the opportunity to travel to Tokyo. As the city hurriedly prepared for the (now postponed) 2020 Olympic Games, there was a city-wide effort to make visitors feel welcome, as well as being especially open to conversation and interaction. It was an ideal time to be in the city.

This portfolio documents a fraction of the spaces, objects and people that Daniel encountered in seven days. He spent his time navigating ten different districts including Omote-Sando, Harajuku, Shinjuku, Shibuya, Gaienmae, Iidabashi, Nakano and Kagurazaka. His goal was an end portfolio that would document Tokyo's constant amalgamation of modernity with tradition, while simultaneously depict detailed portraits of its citizens and spaces.

Daniel McInnis received his MFA from Savannah College of Art and Design and a BFA from Ithaca College. Dan has taught as a professor of photography at Ithaca College, American University in Dubai, School of Visual Arts (SVA), Wittenberg University, and the School of Art at Bowling Green State University. He is currently Associate Professor at the Jesup Scott Honors College at University of Toledo.

His work entitled “Heidi and Lily, Ohio 2014” was selected as a finalist and commended piece in the 2016 Outwin Boochever Portrait Competition at the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution.

All images in the portfolio are Archival Inkjet Prints, 11" X 14", 2019, $250 each.

Lev Spiro

“Night Creatures”

Are plants sentient beings? At certain times of the day, in certain kinds of light, the plants in Lev's garden seem to uproot and move about freely; seeking out the company of others, exploring their surroundings, making their opinions known.

Do they converse? Do they quarrel? Lev sees in them the quest for companionship and the quest for solitude; the longing for meditative space, and the longing for connection.

Their innate otherworldliness shines through in these moments, and it's difficult for him to distinguish them from other life forms, both known and not so well known to us - chiefly those inhabiting the ocean depths, and the interstellar reaches of our collective imaginations.

Lev L. Spiro is a photographer and filmmaker whose fine art photography tries to convey the sense of mystery, awe and wonder he finds in the natural world. A longtime lover of travel, street photography and landscapes, Lev has recently turned his attention to the more intimate landscape of his gardens.

He has studied extensively with photographers Susan Burnstine and Eddie Soloway, as well as Aline Smithson and Maggie Taylor. Images from his series "Fugitive Light" and "Night Creatures" have been chosen for multiple group exhibitions from September 2020 through present, such as the Member's Group Exhibiiton at the Center for Photographic Art in Carmel, CA, The Peer Show at the Cleveland Print Room, and Bloom here at the Midwest Center for Photography, as well as being featured in Art Ascent Magazine as their selected Gold Artist in the June "Gardens" issue.

Lev is also known for his work directing over 165 television episodes, pilots and features, including Emmy-award winning series such as Orange is the New Black, Modern Family, Weeds and Arrested Development. His films "Minutemen" and "Wizards of Waverly Place The Movie" won a Director's Guild nomination for Outstanding Directorial Achievement, and the Emmy Award for Outstanding Children's Program, respectively.

Lev lives in Los Angeles, California with his wife, writer/producer Melissa Rosenberg and their two dogs T. Beau and Luna, who often accompany him and make helpful suggestions as he makes images. You can see more work from the series "Night Creatures" at his website: www.levlspiro.com.

All images in portfolio Archival Pigment Inks on Canson Platine Fibre Rag, 17" X 22, $750 each, editions of 10.

Kristine Hinrichs

This project gets to Krisstine's sense of the city, a place where the elements interact, change each other, and continue to interact - similar to an echo chamber or fun house mirror. She wants the viewer to see what they think is the subject of the image and, upon further reflection, see the other elements that are part of the scene. She wants them to ask “What’s happening here?”. So many people have (often negative) stereotypes of the city. Kristine wants them to see that there is so much to see and experience, if only they will take the time to look and to accept the nuances presented by the interaction of so many elements. She also wants them to understand that change is inevitable and that if they don’t look today, that element, scene, etc. may well be gone or significantly changed tomorrow. Kristine's images make use of reflections to mimic a double exposure and do not involve compositing. They are presented in black & white or color, depending upon the subject.

Kristine Hinrichs is a Milwaukee, Wisconsin based photographer.  She lives in downtown and focuses on the urban environment, an outgrowth of her training and interest in urban planning. She shots with the Olympus mirrorless camera system. On July 2, 2011 she began a “Project 365” and has not missed a day of shooting and posting since that date. This project provides the structure to document the urban environment on an on-going basis.

Her work has been featured in several juried exhibitions – the Racine Art Museum’s biannual Wisconsin Photography 2018 and 2020, Racine Art Museum triennial “Racine and Vicinity Show 2021 All Media Juried Competition”, Plymouth Art Center “Alive in the Arts” in 2020 and 2021, three Praxis Gallery exhibitions, CoPA Milwaukee, Art Bar Milwaukee 2019 & 2021 (Best of Show 2019), Appleton’s Trout Museum SECURA “Fine Arts Exhibition” in 2020 and 2021, Midwest Photography Center “Emerge 2021”, Museum of Wisconsin Art, Artless Bastard, and others.

She is a member of the Milwaukee Coalition of Photographic Arts (CoPA), Photo Midwest, the Milwaukee Artist Resource Network (MARN), and several other arts-related organizations.

All images in the portfolio are Archival Inkjet Prints. 11" X 14", 2021, $200 each.

Susan Richman

"Life in Motion"

Creating a permanent record of the impermanence of our world fascinates me. Because of this interest, I have composed studio images of deceased insects, birds and small animals assembled with botanicals. These images speak to the incongruity between the beauty and the precarious state of our world. Inspired by Victorian Memento Mori, which are photos that exquisitely pose the dead in their finest clothes and surrounded by their favorite objects, I too pose my subjects in an imagined environment. With each photo, I am honoring and memorialize these insects and other small animals whose troubling decline make their recognition important and poignant.

As a child I was responsible for cleaning the bugs that smashed on our  car’s windshield after our nighttime family drives. This memory as well as being an avid gardener has made me aware of the continuing and alarming decrease in the insect population. These observations inspired me to create my series Jenga to explore the juxtaposition between permanence and impermanence and the tension between control and chance. Carefully placed botanical materials, poured colored dyes and the subjects are placed on multiple sheets of glass that are stacked to form a tower. Each sheet of glass is separated by Jenga blocks and can reach a precarious three feet in height. The finished assemblage is photographed resulting in an illusion, a fantasy environment that once captured is dismantled and washed away. It’s not hard to imagine our world crashing down like the Jenga blocks in the game as the supports necessary to sustain our environment are removed one by one.

Born in Washington, Pennsylvania, Richman now lives in Hastings on Hudson, a suburb of NYC. Her love affair with photography began her freshman year of college when she was forced to pick between art or math as a course elective. To the dismay of her parents who were hoping she would become a lawyer, she majored in Fine Arts with a focus on photography and upon graduation she began a successful career as a commercial photographer in Manhattan.

After years of photographing other people’s visions, she has evolved into an artist and educator. Prior to Covid, she was a teacher at The International Center for Photographer in NYC and is currently a member of the Upstream Gallery in NY.

Richman’s interests lie in exploring the link between existence, decay and loss. For the past decade, she has primarily concentrated on photographing images that focus on the damage to our environment by creating images that capture and preserve the fleeting nature of our world. Through art she hopes to increase awareness and inspire change.

Recent awards and recognitions include: 2021 Solo Exhibition of Jenga at The Cloud Gallery at the Griffin Museum;  2021 The Art Of New York Group exhibition at the Arkell Museum; Finalist, 2021 Larry Salley Photography Award, ArtsWestchester; Best Of Show, 2020 Non Member National Juried Exhibition, Salmagundi Club. Recent press includes being a featured artist in the 2021 spring edition of Hook Magazine and in both Create and F Stop Magazines in 2020. In 2019, The New York Times and The Washington Post highlighted her work in an article titled Elements Provide Inspiration at Architectural Digest Show.

All images in the portfolio Archival Pigment Prints, 32" X 48", 2020 - 2021, $2,800 each.

Kathryn Rodrigues

"The Witching Hour"

This series explores ideas of transcendence within a domestic setting and the psychology of motherhood. As a primary caregiver of young children, the majority of my time is spent at home. This can sometimes feel isolating and mundane, but beginning in the late afternoon through the early evening hours our house becomes a repository for light reflections, refractions and shadows. The ghostly patches of light always take on different and fleeting forms and the imagery morphs minute by minute before disappearing abruptly. These ephemeral images appear at a time when everyone is tired, hungry and lacks self-control, providing a transitory respite from the micro-necessities of daily life and the macro-anxieties of the outside world, and facilitating a connection to the curiosities of nature and the creative spirit.

The title of the series refers to both the historic, literary meaning  of “The Witching Hour” as the time of night, usually between 12-3am, when the spirit world is at its most active as well as the contemporary meaning that parents of young children use to refer to the hours just before bedtime when children are at their most chaotic and intense. By choosing to photograph using medium format film, I create space and time to slowly investigate and compose these images. In some, the texture of a wall or a small chip of paint is the only aspect suggesting an object or sense of place, thereby juxtaposing the ethereal and the ordinary. This ongoing series explores the urge to find and document these fleeting but sublime moments of discovery, mystery, whimsy and hope.

Kathryn Rodrigues is a Chicago based artist and educator. She was born in Georgia and her family moved to 10 different locations within the next 13 years, including Brazil, Mozambique, Portugal and Germany, before finally settling in Illinois. Being raised as a third-culture kid left her with a deep interest in identity, memory, domestic life, and the natural world. Her work investigates the interconnectedness of these topics through photography, drawing and mixed media collage. Kathryn received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Photography from the University of Illinois and a Master of Science in Art Education from the Massachusetts College of Art. She has taught courses for children and adults at the Massachusetts College of Art, National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago and Marwen. Exhibition highlights include the Chicago Cultural Center, Woman Made Gallery, Midwest Center for Photography, Spilt Milk Gallery, Open House Contemporary, the Terrain Biennial and ARC Gallery.

All images in the portfolio Archival Pigment Prints, 20" X 24", 2019 - 2020, $400 each.