Light Work Artist-in-Residence Maija Tammi works in collaboration with ���ϲ����� Department of Biology Professor Robert Silver, documenting and experimenting with hydras.

Photography serves as an accurate means to convey what we observe within a specific context or contexts. From its early days, photography has served an important double role in the recording and communication of science and as art form.

Maija Tammi comes to Light Work for a month-long residency to explore what is meant by “biological immortality.” Before her arrival at Light Work and ���ϲ�����, Tammi sought a faculty member with whom she could study the biology of hydra, a small fresh-water animal. Tammi connected with ���ϲ����� Professor of Biology Robert Silver. Silver and Tammi share much in common, including long and deep experience with photography and communicating science to nonscientists.

Tammi is a Finnish artist whose photographs and sculptures converse with science and aesthetics, disgust and fascination. Her work has been exhibited in Europe, North America and Asia. She is currently working on her studio-art-based doctoral thesis at Aalto University School of Arts, Design and Architecture in Helsinki.

In his research, Silver seeks to understand how cells make decisions, focusing on the complex processes and mechanisms from the perspective of fundamental principles in biology, the physical sciences and engineering. His lab is filled with the most advanced light microscopes and cameras, and he has graciously offered Tammi access to the laboratory, to work with her, and to integrate her with his students in Lyman Hall.

Upon first seeing hydra with one of Silver’s microscopes, Tammi exclaimed: “Perfect! I can see so much more.”

Already, in the first two days of her residency, Tammi and Silver have begun experiments, captured images of hydra under various conditions and made observations that confirm and extend published observations of hydra biology. They will also be exploring extending some of the limits of image capture, working with Light Work’s master printer, John Mannion.

Throughout her residency Tammi will be posting her images to the Light Work Instagram account, @lightworkorg.

“Grandma” by Nicola Rinaldo

Exhibiting students include: Michael Ellsenburg, Nicolle Glover, Lauren Harper, Lindsay Jones, Melanie Rose Judson, Connor Martin, Danny Peña, Devi Penny, Nicola Vincenzo Rinaldo, Kyra Lucas Semien, Jessica Sheldon, Victoria Valentine and Leah Vallario.

Heather Snider, executive director of San Francisco Camerawork, served as juror to select images for Best of Show and Honorable Mention. Best of Show went to Rinaldo,and Honorable Mentions went to Penny, Ward and Martin.

According to Snider:

“It was my pleasure to jury this varied selection of works and a have a window into a new era of creative young photographers. But it was a body of work about an older generation that really stood out for me: Nicola Vincenzo Rinaldo’s series titled ‘Grandma.’ All three of these images are arresting for their beauty, intimacy and mystery. Their decidedly subdued black and white palette is reminiscent of Roy DeCarava’s luscious darkness, and perhaps carries the same formally imbedded reference to the shadowy places that marginalized peoples occupy in the mainstream visual dialogue of our culture. While all three of Rinaldo’s photographs use controlled light to great effect, the exquisite details in the photograph of ‘Grandma’ smoking her cigarette by the window make that image exceptionally evocative, with many subtle details that prolong the viewer’s engagement.

Evocative is also the word I would use to describe Devi Penny’s photographs. Penny makes poetic use of shadow and obfuscation. Her subjects seem to be hiding from the light—and what it might reveal—while at the same time playing with it, acknowledging their relationship to the light and controlling their own image within it. Penny uses elements in the environment to place his subjects in simplified frames of line and form, drawing the viewer back to the central mystery and ultimately to confront the eyes of her mysterious subjects.

Kendra Ward’s photographs, especially the photograph ‘Untitled 3,’ employ a cinematic tradition in American visual art that can be traced though the works of such classic 20th century artists as Edward Hopper and Alfred Hitchcock. I love the use of careful framing and planes of subtle color to delineate boundaries, both physical and psychological, with controlled lines of the architecture literally directing the eye to the barriers between two figures, while the gentle brush of yellow coming from the tree above implicates the presence of nature in this drama as well.

Finally, Connor Martin’s surprising ‘Self-Portrait’ exemplifies a spirit of experimentation that I love. Photography lends itself to awkward combinations of both flatness and pictorial depth, and how these two ideas of picture making can work together and against each other at the same time. Martin’s ‘Self-Portrait’ reads as both a nod to the 20th century modernists who knew the picture space had reached its logical demise, while also incorporating subtle, stylistic fingerprints of digital photography, resulting in a dynamic rendering of the human form.”

Light Work’s close partnership with the Department of Transmedia provides art photography students with full access to our production facilities, lectures and workshops. Many students have worked with Light Work throughout their undergraduate careers and have become an integral source of the energy, passion and excitement that defines our organization. The Light Work staff and community congratulate all of the seniors on their accomplishments, and wish them the best in their bright futures within the field of photography.

Snider has over 20 years of experience in the fine art photography field, having worked at several commercial photography galleries in San Francisco (Vision Gallery, Scott Nichols Gallery) and as an independent curator and arts writer for international photography publications.

Kristine Potter, “Untitled, 2009” from “The Gray Line “

“The Gray Line” is a series of portraits that Potter made at West Point Military Academy, which has trained a large number of high-ranking Army officers and eventual U.S. politicians. Raised in a military family, Potter notes that “a very particular kind of patriarchy and folklore associated with military heroism” pervaded her childhood years. In this series of photographs, made between 2005 and 2010 at the height of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, Potter attempts to disrupt the binary language that conflict seems to publicly heighten. “I’m not interested in voicing opinions of whether war is right or wrong. It exists. My voice has always focused on the human drama. These are people, and they get used in the political sphere. But in the end, they’re not symbols, they’re humans with complex feelings and lives, and I find that compelling.”

Born in Dallas, Potter earned both a B.F.A. in photography and a B.A. in art history at the University of Georgia in 2000. From 2000-2003, she lived and worked as a professional printer in Paris. In 2005, she earned her M.F.A. in photography from Yale University. Potter has exhibited work in Paris, New York City, Miami, Atlanta and Raleigh, North Carolina. Daniel Cooney Fine Art in New York City represents her, with a book, “Manifest,” forthcoming.