"Why is photography important?" and "How does one become a collector of photography?" with Helen Trompeteler, Deputy Director of Silver Eye Center for Photography

5. Why is photography important? 

Photography is a vital form of creative self-expression. It can create empowering spaces for connection with ourselves and each other. When artists center curiosity, empathy, and social concern in their practice, photography can challenge conventions, biases, and structural inequalities. Through such photography, we can imagine and work towards more equitable futures. Photography is important to me when it provokes me to critically question history, society, and representation and continually reflect on how photographs are made, read, circulated and understood. Most of all, photography is important in any way that an individual finds meaningful. That relationship has the potential to be limitless. 

Spring by Marc Wilson from the series ‘Travelogue 1’ made in Ukraine between 2018-2021. © Marc Wilson

6. How does one become a collector of photography? 

Relationships are fundamental to becoming a collector of photography - whether with artists, gallerists, curators, arts workers, cultural producers, or writers. Start going to events at galleries or organizations whose programs directly support and engage with artists. These experiences will offer the opportunity to discover new work, develop your interests, and connect with artists directly in meaningful and authentic ways. I don't think the commercial value should drive your collecting. But instead, collect what you love and fully embrace that this will inevitably change and grow in unexpected ways.

In Pittsburgh, we are fortunate to have many accessible pathways to start collecting. Such local opportunities include editions from Silver Eye, regular juried shows by local non-profits such as Associated Artists of Pittsburgh and Brew House Association, Small Mall, and the emergence of new independent art galleries such as Here. Most of my recent personal collecting has been through fundraising initiatives raising awareness on issues that are important to me. I encourage new collectors to consider how their collecting purposefully aligns with their values. Ultimately, when collecting work by contemporary photographers, you directly support the future development of their artistic practice, which is one of the most rewarding reasons to start collecting.

Challenging the Canon: Olga Yatskevich on Photobook History

Co-founded by Russet Lederman and Olga Yatskevich in 2012, 10x10 Photobooks foster engagement with the global photobook community through the appreciation, dissemination, and understanding of photobooks. The PGH Photo Fair has partnered with 10 x 10 Photobooks on all their previous touring reading rooms, including in 2019 for How We See: Photobooks by Women, which presented a global range of contemporary photobooks by women.

Follow-up project, What They Saw: Historical Photobooks by Women 1843–1999, focuses on historically significant photobooks produced by women. Officially released on 1 November 2021, the book was recently shortlisted for the Paris Photo - Aperture Foundation Catalogue of the Year Award 2021.

Helen Trompeteler spoke with Olga Yatskevich about 10x10’s ongoing exploration of photobook history and the underrepresentation of women in this field. 

How does your own cultural and personal background inform your approach to the photobook? Do you have a particular early experience with a photobook or reading room which inspired your engagement with this art form?

My interest in photography is fairly typical. My grandfather was a serious amateur photographer, I would spend hours looking at family photo albums and often re-arranging photographs. I spent a big part of my life moving between countries, first with my parents as a kid and later for school and work. I was constantly exploring new places and taking photos felt pretty natural. And I’ve always been a book person but my interest in photobook shaped when I moved to NYC. I started making connections with the local photo community, both in person and online. That’s how I met Russet Lederman, my partner in 10x10 Photobooks. I invited Russet and Jeff Gutterman, her husband, to come to a photobook meet-up I was organizing and talk about Japanese photobooks from their extensive collection. In a way that was the beginning of our 10x10 project.

We started 10x10 Photobooks with a very simple idea - to bring to New York contemporary Japanese photobooks, not easily available through regular distribution. We invited ten people to suggest ten photobooks published by Japanese photographers. We brought these books in a pop-up reading room and invited people to come to the space and spend time with the books. The project came together in just about two months. Our first reading room, titled 10x10 Japanese Photobooks, was launched in September 2012 during NY Art Book Fair, and was sponsored by the International Center of Photography.

Histories of the photobook have existed for some years now. For example, Martin Parr and Gerry Badger’s multi-volume history published between 2004-2014 was a high-profile series on this subject. However, the politics of selection is an important consideration. The photography and publishing industries have frequently had their histories shaped by ‘gatekeepers’ with social or financial influence. For example, Helmut Gernsheim and Beaumont Newhall wrote hugely influential books that shaped twentieth-century photo history, neither of which included many women photographers. At 10x10, your collective approach to constructing histories resists this model of selection, incorporating more democratic forums for dialogue across reading rooms, publications, and events. Can you talk a little about this underlying ethos of co-creation?

From the very beginning 10x10 was about community, collaboration, inclusion and diversity. 10x10 was about bringing together people with different backgrounds - publishers, photographers, collectors, writers, designers, curators - and various interests within photography, but with common passion - photobooks. 10x10 wanted to provide a platform for a conversation. Almost a decade later we are a non-profit organization, and our mission is the same - to foster engagement with the global photobook community through an appreciation, dissemination and understanding of photobooks.

We have completed four major reading rooms - focusing on Japanese, American, contemporary Latin American Photobooks and photobooks by women. To put these projects, we brought together a diverse group of contributors. They followed a similar format; our experts were asked to each select a number of photobooks. We also ask each selector to write a short statement to explain what brings these books together, which helps people understand the individual books and to see the connections between them. 

When 10x10 produced How We See, the program of touring reading rooms relied on the tactility of the objects. In interviews at the time, Russet Lederman discussed that 10x10 didn’t include historical works due to the inability to show them and have the public interact with them. One of the aspects of the new book I love is how objects have been photographed to emphasize a wide variety of material histories and qualities. How will this translate into what is shown in the reading rooms program for What They Saw?

We had the photobooks included in all our previous reading rooms. Inviting people in a space where they can touch books, flip through the pages, smell the ink was always essential to us. That’s why we also donated the books from each reading room to a dedicated public library, so people continue to have access to them. Many books discussed in What They Saw are still available for a reasonable price, and we were able to purchase a good portion of them. But there is a number of rare books too, like Anna Atkins’ “Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions” (1843-1853). Some of them are unique albums, like the one put together by Kate A. Williams with the cards collected during her travels in Europe to share with friends, or a carte-de-visite album by Arabella Chapman, a Black middle-class woman in Albany, New York; her albums include photographs of friends, family, and leading abolitionists. These types of publications are unique, we hope to create flip through videos to showcase them. We also tried to illustrate them extensively in our publication. We are planning to partner with institutions that already have many of these books in their collection. Our first reading room will be in partnership with the New York Public Library in May 2022. 

Arabella Chapman, Carte-de-Visite Albums, in ‘What They Saw: Historical Photobooks by Women, 1843–1999’. Courtesy 10 x 10 Photobooks

To truly challenge the canon of photo history, I think it is essential to collaborate with experts from other fields – across political, cultural, and social disciplines – as all these factors work towards shaping and constructing knowledge. Can you talk a little about the selection of writers for What They Saw and whether this was a concern?

Producing a publication like this one requires a big team. We invited Mariama Attah who is curator of Open Eye Gallery in Liverpool to write an overview essay. To address the current photobook history, she brings the metaphor of a popular Mercator projection that distorts the relative size of landmasses. She articulates a number of questions we are trying to cover with this project. The book has ten chapters, and we brought scholars, both western and non-western, to write them. These chapters also map key political, cultural and social events that influenced those decades, and briefly mention the books discussed in detail for that chapter putting them in that context. Carole Naggar is a photography historian, and also a writer and poet. Elizabeth Cronin is a curator at the New York Public Library. Paula Kupfer brings a Latin American perspective, while Michiko Kasahara offers a perspective from Japan. Jörg Colberg, originally from Germany and now based in the United States, is a writer, photographer, and educator. 

A huge amount of communal effort went into this publication. Many people contributed to this publication; our acknowledgement list is pretty long. We also had a number of PhD students and researchers who contributed drafting book blurbs. Our designer, Ayumi Higuchi, had an enormous task of putting together all the elements, and I think she did an incredible job.   

There are many practical and structural reasons why women photographers have been omitted or underrepresented in history. Many male-owned nineteenth-century studios relied on female labor, but their names and histories have been largely unrecorded. Sometimes women photographers operated under a pseudonym, or their change of name through marriage means their lives become harder to trace through archival records. As periodicals and the magazine industry boomed during the early twentieth century, images were often reproduced uncredited. Reclaiming and working with historical material within photobooks can be a way to address these omissions. Please can you talk a little about this theme of archival loss or absence - and perhaps give a few favorite examples of innovative photobooks that have addressed this specifically?

There were a number of factors that kept women’s names from the proper acknowledgment in the publication and public eye. To expand this conversation and widen the frame, we had to reconsider our definition of a photobook, so we included individual albums, maquettes, zines and pamphlets. But we are expanding this conversation to include not only women, but make it as inclusive as possible. 

Take for example, Isabel Agnes Cowper, for over 20 years she was the official photographer in the South Kensington Museum but was not credited in any of the publications and remained neglected until recent research and the scrutiny of the museum archives. Now she is recognized as the first woman to hold the title of official museum photographer. Her photographs document museum exhibitions, objects in its collections and the construction of museum facilities. In our publication we included one of the earliest volumes illustrated with her photographs, “Catalogue of the Special Loan Exhibition of Decorative Art Needlework Made Before 1800” published in 1874. 

There are many forms of individual self-publishing. But more broadly, power dynamics are often involved in every stage of the photobook process – editing, captioning, design, circulation. Editing and sequencing especially rarely receive critical study within the history of photography. Many post-war historians emphasized notions of the master photographer at the expense of this broader contextualization of the medium. How can we encourage an approach that moves away from solely focusing on notions of single authorship to acknowledge these wider contributions and contexts?

Women have consistently contributed to the photobook history, and as early as the mid 18th century. However, their contributions were often neglected, misrepresented or diminished. What They Saw starts to identify where we might find these voices. It is important to keep questioning dominant historical narratives, as individual contributions too often get lost or overshadowed. To represent these fragmented and incomplete histories, we included timeline entries that need further research. 

There are examples of women supporting their husbands in their commercial photographic endeavours, and hardly getting any mention. In the 1860s in Japan, Ryu Shima had a studio with her husband and most likely contributed to two albums, her name is not credited. Ashraf os-Saltaneh, an Iranian princess and one of the earliest women photographers in the country, kept her husband’s diary and most likely used her photographs for illustrations. There are so many examples. Uncovering and sharing these stories help us to see a bigger picture.  

Zofia Rydet, Mały człowiek, in ‘What They Saw: Historical Photobooks by Women, 1843–1999’. Courtesy 10 x 10 Photobooks

Especially since the 1970s, women have found a platform at the intersections of theoretical, political, and autobiographical writing in photography. Even before this, photographers such as Dorothy Wilding and Madame Yevonde safe-guarded their place in photo history by writing memoirs, seeking empowerment by telling their story in their own words. So, I’m interested in how women have had to write themselves and their careers into photo history. Jo Spence’s undergraduate thesis was recently published in full for the first time. This exciting revisiting of past visual texts encourages a much richer history and new opportunities for contemporary dialogue. The use of language is an integral part of who is represented and how. Therefore, please can you talk a little about this relationship – how do you see these intersections between life writing and the traditions of the photobook?

Gisèle Freund wrote the first Ph.D. on photography in 1936, and a couple of years later Lucia Moholy, Both a photographer and a scholar, wrote “A Hundred Years of Photography”; it sold out immediately, in forty thousand copies. It was 1942, when Elizabeth McCausland, an American historian and art critic, wrote one of the first essays on the still new medium of the photobook titled Photographic Books. Sadly, her legacy got forgotten over the years, her essay wasn't referenced in any of the recent anthologies. When we launched our How We See project, we also reprinted the essay and had copies available during the reading rooms. Kristen Lubben, in her essay Partial Histories: Looking at Photobooks by Women for “How We See”, talks about McCausland and her contribution. 

A potential critique when drawing attention to creative practice on the grounds of gender alone is that it is, in a way, reductive. The statistics you gathered while producing How We See, and regularly shared by groups such as Women Photograph and Guerilla Girls are irrefutable. Nevertheless, speaking in binaries between male and female gaze can be problematic. How can we make these discussions as inclusive as possible, incorporating non-binary and genderfluid identities into these discussions of photobook history?

Our How We See project, required that all photography contributions in a selected book are women, and those who identify as women. We used the same approach for What They Saw. As we explore the photobook history, inclusivity is one of our primary goals.

The potential of movement that is inherent with photobooks have made them so central to political movements, including second and third-wave feminism. Zines, newspapers, leaflets, pamphlets can all be shared easily, sent cheaply, travel between countries – they are an effective way of circumventing the establishment. Can you talk a little about your views on what constitutes a feminist photobook? How do you see the potential of photobooks as agents of such political action?

What makes a photobook feminist? There is no simple way to define this. In early years access to publishing was rather privileged, and many women who had this access used it to state their independence, economic, sexual or artistic. Today photobooks are versatile, inexpensive and democratic. They can easily travel, share ideas and ultimately empower. 

There are definitely a number of photobooks I would consider as an example in What They Saw. From a late 19th century album made for the Women’s Social and Political Union by Christina Broom and Isabel Marion Seymour with portraits of the Suffragettes to Elsa Dorfman’s “Elsa’s Housebook: A Woman’s Photojournal” which documented the rich social life of a young woman in the 1970s and Abigail Heyman’s "Growing up female: a personal photojournal", giving us a frank portrait of what it means to be female in the United States in the 1970s.

I think a great example of political action is a photobook, a pamphlet to be precise, by Alice Seeley Harris titled “The Camera and the Congo Crime”. Published around 1906, it is one of the earliest examples of a humanitarian photographic campaign. Harris’ images reveal the colonial atrocities endured by the Congolese people. It played a key role in bringing attention to these atrocities committed under King Leopold II. 

Or another, perhaps more known book, and an example of both feminist and protest book is “Immagini del no” (Images of No) published in 1974, with photographs by Paola Mattioli and Anna Candiani. It was published in the wake of the Italian referendum to repeal an earlier law legalizing divorce. It made a direct appeal for political change in women’s issues. 

Christina Broom and Isabel Marion Seymour, WSPU Postcards Album, in ‘What They Saw: Historical Photobooks by Women, 1843–1999’. Courtesy 10 x 10 Photobooks

Paola Mattioli and Anna Candiani, Immagini del no, in ‘What They Saw: Historical Photobooks by Women, 1843–1999’. Courtesy 10 x 10 Photobooks

Many factors impact women’s ability to sustain a creative practice – including class, money, domestic and caring responsibilities. The business aspects of women’s creativity are often completed neglected in photo histories. Historically, there has often been a snobbery around art-making and book-making being seen in this context of commerce. The reality is that to live creatively is often to live fragmentally across many different models of working and living. Does What They Saw invite a provocation to think differently about how we view success? Or, indeed, evaluate and record success within history?

How do we define success? What is our criteria for progress? In early years only women with privileged social positions were able to pursue photography. They were married to someone or came from privileged families. (And obviously, there were other factors, outside gender.) They had the means to purchase equipment, or to learn photography at first as a hobby. These women were trailblazers, they paved the way for others, and considering the context in which they worked, their contributions are extraordinary. 

Each chapter in our publication sets the historical context for the books discussed within it. What are the factors that contributed to making certain books possible? We spent a lot of time searching for photobooks by Black women made between the 1960s and 1980s. We don't know how many women tried to publish books in those years, but as we talked to people it became clear that there was simply no funding for these books. “The Decorative Arts of Africa” by Louise E. Jefferson, released in 1974, is a rare example of a book that did find support. Jefferson was also the first Black woman with a director’s position in the publishing industry. Has that had an impact? These are the questions we are bringing up.

In the past few years, a number of great photobooks were published showing the body of work that was 40 years old, and just did not find recognition it deserved at that time. 

Presenting diverse ethnic, cultural, and geographic backgrounds has been central to What They Saw from its inception. How can we work to ensure against future gaps and omissions in photobook history, in particular the lack of access, support, and funding for photobooks by non-Western women and women of color? How do you think publishers can better support a range of visions that are non-Western?

When we started working on How We See, we conducted research to get an idea on the representation of photobooks by women. The numbers were quite shocking. Photobooks by women made up only 10.5% of the entries in the six major “book-on-books” anthologies, three major photobook publishers had only 16.2% of photobooks by women in their online titles. However, I think if we look at the past three years, we will notice a shift. I think the conversation, on different levels, is very important. It is essential to have editors who are sensitive and consider different voices. We need to engage designers with various backgrounds. We have to continue to advocate for inclusivity within the high-profile sectors of the photobook community. As one puts together exhibitions, publishes photobooks, organizes fairs, acquires books for libraries, manages awards, let’s make sure the process is inclusive. The single story creates stereotypes, and the problem is not that they are untrue, but that they result in incomplete narratives.

Ellen Kolban Thorbecke, People in China: Thirty Two Photographic Studies from Life, in ‘What They Saw: Historical Photobooks by Women, 1843–1999’. Courtesy 10 x 10 Photobooks

Lesley Lawson, Working Women: A Portrait of South Africa’s Black Women Workers, in ‘What They Saw: Historical Photobooks by Women, 1843–1999’. Courtesy 10 x 10 Photobooks

The identity and interests of collectors play an essential part in shaping histories. The MUUS Collection supports What They Saw and its associated research grants. Please can you talk a little about how this relationship with the MUUS Collection started and has evolved? What can you tell us about this year’s research grants and what to expect regarding future programming relating to them?

10x10 Research Grants on Photobook History was initiated and administered by our board members, David Solo and Richard Grosbard, and were launched last Fall. We are grateful to the MUUS Collection, and their generous support of this important initiative. Their mission which is to make visible their photography collection and archives through exhibitions, scholarship, donations, licensing, and the printing of images and books, overlaps with 10x10’s.

With this grant 10x10 contributes to our mission by encouraging and supporting scholarship on under-explored topics in photobook history. The first year’s theme focuses on research into the history of women and photobooks from 1843 to 1999.

We received a good number of submissions and our jury members - Susan Bright, Sarah Meister and Ingrid Masondo – were impressed with the range and strength of research topics. While we originally planned to select two grantees, this year we decided to award three grants, $1,500 each.

Faride Mereb, an artist and independent publisher from Venezuela, will process and digitize archives of Karmele Leizaola, an important contributor to the publishing scene in Venezuela. Yasmine Nachabe Taan, Associate Professor in visual culture at the Lebanese American University, will focus on Catherine Leroy’s photobook “God Cried” (1983), a little-known book about the intense and violent conflicts in Beirut. Uschi Klein, a researcher at University of Brighton, will collect more materials about the life and work of Romanian photographer Clara Spitzer.

We will have public events to share the progress of their research with the photobook community. The high number of submissions indicates that we need to continue to support more research into the history of the photobook.

Lastly, how has your work on this project and with 10x10 Photobooks influenced your own collecting practices?

This is definitely a two-way process, our personal interests in collecting photobooks inform our 10x10 programming. Our projects come together as we engage in long conversations and brainstorming sessions, we try to determine overlooked regions and subjects, bring fresh ideas and share what inspires us. Needless to say, that through our projects I always discover new books, and purchase many of them for my own collection. Photobooks provide an opportunity to meet people, - artists, publishers, designers - support their work and share them with a wider audience.  

What They Saw: Historical Photobooks by Women, 1843–1999. Courtesy 10 x 10 Photobooks

To find out more the work of 10 x 10 Photobooks, visit their website or follow them on Instagram @10x10photobooks

Reimagining Aperture: In conversation with Sarah Meister

For over 25 years, Sarah Meister built an exceptional curatorial career at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, where her many critically acclaimed exhibitions and publications included Fotoclubismo: Brazilian Modernist Photography, 1946–1964 (2021), Dorothea Lange: Words & Pictures (2020), and Gordon Parks: The Atmosphere of Crime, 1957 (2020). She was the lead instructor for the online course Seeing Through Photographs and co-director of the August Sander Project. 

In May 2021, Sarah Meister joined Aperture as Executive Director, where she oversees Aperture’s book publishing and flagship magazine, educational and outreach programs, and creative partnerships with artists and institutions. Helen Trompeteler recently spoke with Sarah about Aperture’s history, her vision for its future, and the central role of photography in our contemporary experience.

Thinking about personal beginnings in photography, I know you initially engaged with photography as a practitioner. And then you studied with Peter Bunnell, who sadly passed away recently. And I wondered if you would like to share a few details of this time?

My own beginnings in photography don’t really bear mention. But I will say by the time I met Peter Bunnell; I had made peace with the fact that, as I learned of real achievements in photography, I understood the gap between those and my own. So yes, I’ve been thinking a lot about Peter recently and our sort of twinned arcs through the photography world. Peter, starting at Aperture, and then going to MoMA and then going to Princeton - and myself, starting at Princeton, then going to MoMA and then going to Aperture. There’s wonderful serendipity in that.

He was a very important figure to so many people in the field. Just today, I was talking with someone who was thinking about what it would mean to trace not just the first generation of people who studied with him directly, but those who have studied with those who studied with him, which then really covers a tremendous section of the field. Especially in his curatorial work, he was really pushing boundaries that people are just now in recent decades catching up to understand. And so that person I was talking with was sort of bemoaning, ‘oh, it's too bad, he didn’t stay a curator’. But I think I’m a little bit glad he didn’t stay a curator, selfishly, and I’m taking the same feeling to heart - I loved being a curator, but it is exciting to do something different.

Maquette and final edition of Aperture issue 1, 1952, featuring an untitled photograph by Dorothea Lange. Courtesy The Minor White Archive, Princeton University Art Museum. Bequest of Minor White.
Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University

Before we talk about Aperture in more detail, I wanted to reflect a little on your last exhibition at MoMA. Fotoclubismo was such a revelation to me; it introduced me to many new artists that I hadn’t discovered before. And it made me think a lot about the exclusions that can happen in photography - whether around boundaries of distinction or geographical biases. Can you share a few reflections on this aspect of the exhibition, and also discuss how you propose to counter such biases when directing future programming at Aperture?

Well, I think that the first thing is acknowledging your own complicity in constructing these narratives of exclusion. And that’s not easy work, but that is what is required of each of us going forward. And I would say that was the perfect exhibition to be thinking about, as the country and the world were grappling with this idea of how the structures and systems in which we have operated, served to suppress, to diminish, to distract, from larger, more important stories.

Photography is an unruly mess, you know, we know this. And on some level, to make sense of it, we set up these hierarchies to say - okay, here, this is art, science, journalism, and this is amateur photography. And, inevitably, when you’re drawing these structures, you’re creating hierarchies. You’re simplifying for the sake of understanding. Where I am now, and where I hope Aperture will be, is in a sense a kind of leaning into the porosity of this. Photography isn’t neat, life isn’t neat, history isn’t neat. We just need to make peace with that as a way of moving forward. 

And so yes, I believe that understanding and clarity can come through considerations of individual achievements. Yes, I loved that my last exhibition at MoMA was about amateur practices. And that was a very important thing for me to finish thinking through. And then, once I had thought it through, I thought I would rather contemplate where photography is in the world today, not within the context of a modern art museum, even though that was an unbelievable privilege and gift for my whole career. But what happens when you put photography at the center and see how that expands from there? It felt like once that exhibition was on view, I said to myself, okay, I think I’m done, I think I’m ready. 26 and a half years later, if I’m going to leave MoMA for anything, I’m happy it’s for Aperture.

Installation view of Fotoclubismo: Brazilian Modernist Photography, 1946–1964, May 8, 2021 - September 26, 2021. The Museum of Modern Art, New York. Photo: Jonathan Muzikar

Aperture closed its permanent gallery space in Chelsea just before the pandemic. And that must have necessitated new opportunities for collaboration with exhibition partners. Are you able to share anything about plans for Aperture’s future physical space? Or perhaps it’s too early to talk about that?

I mean, it’s early in that I don’t have one that I could tell you about. But I can tell you; Aperture won’t have an exhibition space in Manhattan in the way it did, although we intend to have space to convene with our audiences and share what we do. And that was a strategic decision that the organization made before I arrived. There are so many places in New York City where photographs are displayed. And at a time when resources are limited, how you function as a nonprofit is an expression of where you want to be in the work you want to do. I think that what Aperture does that no one else can do is be a kind of catalyst of understanding and connective tissue between universities and museums and artists and audiences in a way that doesn’t require an exhibition space in Manhattan. 

Even right now, there are two exhibitions on view at ICP that emerged out of Aperture publications. So, this is emblematic I hope of the future for Aperture. I don’t think we need to operate a space in New York. I’m very grateful that the decision was made before I arrived, but it is a decision I support. At the same time, the ICP exhibitions are different in that those were organized by ICP. But Aperture itself organizes exhibitions in partnership – for example, Antwaun Sargent for The New Black Vanguard or Wendy Red Star for Native America, or Kwame Brathwaite. We have all these incredible exhibitions, that for decades have been traveling around the country and around the world. And I confess, I wasn’t sufficiently appreciative of that fact. I had really thought about exhibitions as something that you needed a major museum for to make value for the public. But what Aperture’s exhibitions have shown me - and these are exhibitions that go to the Blanton Museum, or the Detroit Institute of Art, for example - we have extraordinary partners around the country and around the world, who help our ideas reach audiences through these exhibitions. 

So, I think on some level, this is an unwinding of my snobbery. There is an important role that museums and museum curators play in bringing together photographs as objects and as ideas. And I believe in the aura of photography. Yet, I also have been coming to realize that there’s a preciousness associated with that. And that is somehow at odds with the fundamentally democratic nature of the medium. And that you can both honor and respect photographs in that context and understand that giving broader audiences a chance to interact with similar ideas in ways that are much more cost-effective, and dare I say, on a popular level, that’s really valuable too. And when I say popular, I don’t mean less significant in terms of their intellectual ambition; I simply mean placed in the path of more people.

One of the last things I did at MoMA was work on a Walker Evans exhibition that’s being circulated through Art Bridges. And the idea was, why should you have to live in a major urban area to access to these objects and ideas? And that is a persuasive question. And so, I love the ways in which Aperture’s exhibitions will really flourish in the world, even without a space in New York City from which they launch.

Dana Scruggs, Fire on the Beach, 2019, from The New Black Vanguard (Aperture, 2019)

Thinking about Aperture’s beginnings, it perhaps initially reached a limited group of photographers, editors, and educators. Over many decades since, its audience has grown into a global community of readers interested in images, culture, and society. How do you personally critically reflect on who the audiences of Aperture are and should be? And what are your hopes for how Aperture can best serve the photography community today?

Well, one of the things I loved before I even applied for the job, I was working on Fotoclubismo and thinking about this post war moment. And reading Peter Bunnell’s edited book about the Minor White years at Aperture, which is an extraordinary resource. I looked at it for the Dorothea Lange Words and Pictures exhibition, and I returned to it often. So, by the time they called me to interview, all of this was at the very front of my mind because Aperture was singularly important in framing things that we have come to accept. Well, it was singularly important in a way that has maybe become oversimplified in time, but what I loved is that as I was looking back, that diverse audience was present from the very beginning. So, in the second editorial of Aperture magazine, Melton Ferris, one of the lesser-known founders of the magazine, wrote: ‘Aperture draws no editorial boundaries between the professional and the amateur, the pictorialist and the documentarian, the journalist and the scholar’. And I thought to myself, wow, what a remarkable declaration of ambition for a magazine. And wouldn’t it be great if, instead of trying to create hierarchies and structure, we went back to that and really embraced the idea of an audience for photography that encompasses everyone who holds a camera in their back pocket? And so, I think Aperture’s history points to this direction in some ways, and that aligns philosophically and ethically with where I think the medium is and can be.

One of the many things I admired during your tenure at MoMA was your Seeing Through Photographs course, which was a landmark in bringing educational access to photography collections in such an accessible way. I think you reached some 375,000 learners. How has that experience informed your ideas for how Aperture’s digital programs could evolve in the future?

Well, that course and that experience engaging with those learners, I’m forever grateful to Seeing Through Photographs. What I brought to that was how much I love thinking about photographs in the world today. And what all those learners brought was a consciousness in my mind of how much broader that interest is. And, on some level, the example of that course, I think, led me to Aperture because Aperture wants to and can be a point of connection for anyone interested in photography. 

And so, in terms of digital programming, we continue to think about how Aperture’s website can reach broader audiences. One of the new initiatives that we’re going to be doing, that on some level was inspired by Seeing Through Photographs, is we’re going to start an Aperture photo book club. On some level, it emerged during COVID with all our online programming around photographs, but it is anchoring it within an appreciation of photography through photo books. And the principle is that if we gather a small number of people in let’s say, my living room, we’ll talk about images and ideas and words and pictures and design and circulation, and all the things that fascinate me about photography. And if we do this, with artists and designers and editors and writers - we are opening up possibilities for understanding for that very audience. And then, of course, they carry it through not only in their enjoyment of that particular book that they might be holding on their lap at home, as we’re discussing it – it’s physical accessibility, not just an intellectual one. 

Teju Cole has a beautiful piece in The Guardian from 2020, where he says that to enjoy photographs online is like a facsimile of the original. It’s like instant coffee or artificial flowers, or frozen pizza. And yet, a photo book is an actual physical enjoyment in the privacy of your own home. Meaning that museums are one way of doing it, but a photo book is another, once you help people understand its functions – for example, what do the head and tail bands mean? What do the end papers do? How do you understand how the titles live with respect to the images? This is an educational opportunity really that people can carry forward to other books and other places.

And so, I’ll also say that Seeing Through Photographs showed me how difficult it is to develop an online course. So, I’m not sure that that is going to be the best model for Aperture. But I think that the ethos of it and the principle of making ideas accessible through digital technologies to audiences around the world is something that we really want to attend to.

And so, my next question, Aperture’s magazine has a very distinctive identity, with each issue focused on a thought-provoking theme. And I wondered if you wanted to sustain that overall approach or whether you and colleagues are beginning to collaboratively explore new approaches to the content, form, and structure of the magazine?

Well, I have to say, I have such tremendous respect for Michael Famighetti, Brendan Embser, and Nicole Acheampong - and the magazine team is amazing. You know, the magazine is just tremendously important, and it has been since 1952. It is the heart of what Aperture does, and whether that’s for example, the Vision and Justice issue, that then blossoms into a series of books that we hope we’re doing with Sarah Lewis and Deb Willis, and Leigh Raiford - or the exhibition program and issue of the magazine. But there is, I think, a sense of if you are not specifically interested in the theme of a particular issue of the magazine, how can we make sure that there’s enough to sustain the interest of somebody who’s interested in photography writ large? And so, the one thing I asked Michael, Brendan, and Nicole to think through with me was, how can we build up the front and the back of the magazine? Not to disrupt the incredible things that they’re doing, but to say, how do we make sure that every issue of the magazine attends to this broad audience that I have in mind?

Obviously, the compelling photographs and the portfolios in an issue that respond to the theme, the amazing writers that they get, all of this can and should be undisturbed. But there are people for whom that isn’t a sufficient reason to subscribe to the magazine. We're even incorporating photo book reviews, which had been a twice annual ride along with the magazine, into the magazine itself to think what can we do to make every issue of the magazine speak to anyone with a serious interest in the medium. You’ll notice in the magazine’s upcoming issue, this will begin to take root, and it will blossom on from there. And I think what’s been wonderful is that I wouldn’t presume to tell Michael Famighetti what to do, but he has been marvelously responsive to this, and he wants to grow the subscriptions as well, and he wants this magazine to be in the hands of more people. And so, we’ve had a really good time thinking about how to protect all the great things they have done. For me, even as a curator, the magazine was an unbelievable resource. When I was working on Gordon Parks and the Atmosphere of Crime, I took Nicole Fleetwood’s Prison Nation issue like my textbook. We don’t want to do anything to disrupt that. But I do want to think about anyone who isn’t a subscriber, why not? It speaks to a sophisticated audience, and it should, but there are ways of helping encourage accessibility that we’re thinking about.

Aperture announced the 2021 photo book awards shortlist this morning, and I’ve been catching up with this news. And I wondered if you could give a few examples of favorite recent publications, which for you personally, have extended your expectations around what a photo book could be, in terms of form or approach?

First of all, I think all of the honorable mentions on that list are doing that because those are really expanding the form. I’ll also say, first of all, I was very careful not to interfere with the jury. I wouldn’t even let myself go up to the room where this was all happening because I didn’t want to influence anything. But for instance, Farah Al Qasimi’s book that Capricious published was one that I had ordered personally. Because I’m really interested in Farah's work and that idea of how an attentiveness to the commercial languages of photography can be understood in a very serious artistic context. But, one of the things I love about the submissions to that prize, in general, is what that tells about the vitality of the medium and about the ways in which photographers are probing how their photographs ought to exist on pages. 

And when I was a juror, not this year, but the year before, I was so inspired by all that was happening in that field. It’s one expression of recognition of how photographs circulate in the world, for example, from Walker Evans American Photographs through to The Americans, and forwards - the ways in which photographs live on the printed page in books and magazines, and online, these are all an inseparable part of the medium. 

Farah Al Qasimi, Lady Lady, 2020. Courtesy Helena Anrather and The Third Line, Dubai. From Aperture Magazine 241 “Utopia”

Aperture is also currently preparing its 2021 gala, which celebrates the range of your publishing program. And I wondered if you could talk a little about the decision process behind this year’s selection of artists and maybe expand on the work of some of its recipients like Sara Cwynar, for example.

So historically, Aperture has had themes for its galas. After I accepted the role and before I started, we were talking, and they asked, what’s our theme? And I said, what if our theme is no theme? What if our theme is this very plurality that the editors of Aperture were articulating from the start? Our theme is truly no theme, which is to say, Aperture wants to engage with what’s happening in the world today, and we do this through our publishing program, and we want to do this through our gala. So, the three honorees really occupy different positions in the field, and in the end, that’s why they are together.

Graciela Iturbide is an amazing photographer whose work I had acquired while I was a curator at MoMA. It was on view in our inaugural reinstallation in a gallery that my colleague Lucy Gallun had organized. And Aperture is doing a workshop series book with Graciela that’s coming out in early 2022. So, Aperture had visited her when the Mexico City issue of the magazine came out, and it just felt like she represented a means of engaging with photography and its history that was important to uphold and to celebrate. 

Sara Cwynar has a very different approach to photography and image-making and the commodification and circulation of photographs in the world today. She is also somebody I had worked with at MoMA. We had commissioned her to do a project and worked on an acquisition of a series of photographs. And so, when I signed on for Aperture, and I learned that they were publishing this first major monograph of her work, I thought this was so fantastic. And the book itself is so smart in that it interweaves her practices between video and still photography and helps make these connections accessible. It’s not only a beautiful book, but it gives a sense of her approach to her practice that I think is really important.

So, these were two women whose work I admired, and then what Dr. Kenneth Montague has done with The Wedge Collection as a collector aligns so beautifully with so many of Aperture’s artists and voices that Aperture wants to bring forward. And so, doing books of collections, that’s a different way of saying, this too is important to Aperture and important in the world. We’re launching Kenneth’s book As We Rise: Photography from the Black Atlantic at the end of this month.

So, there is no connection between Sara and Graciela and Kenneth, other than they connect with and think deeply about photographs in a way that models where I see the future of the medium. 

Cover from Glass Life (Aperture,2021). © Sara Cwynar

Your previous exhibitions on Dorothea Lange and Gordon Parks reflect your interest in and value of the social purpose of photography. And thinking about our current social and political time, how do you perceive photography's role in the context of justice and equity? Aperture’s Vision and Justice issue, which you mentioned earlier, had a huge impact. But how do you think Aperture can embed and continually expand those social values?

Well, yes, I mentioned that issue of the magazine really was a catalyst for all kinds of thinking, in a very meaningful way. And Sarah Lewis deserves extraordinary credit for helping people think through how photography and vision and justice are interrelated. I’m so thrilled that we will partner with Sarah going forward, as I mentioned in passing briefly before. But with this work, you don’t begin it and end it; this is ongoing. And when you grasp how photographs have that possibility throughout history - this was true for Dorothea Lange and Gordon Parks, and this is certainly true today - when you engage with that possibility, you understand that this is just essential work that can’t ever take a backseat; it has to always remain front of mind. 

And I was very fortunate that at MoMA, I was able to pursue projects and acquisitions that allowed these ways of thinking to be front of my mind on a daily basis. And whether it was thinking about Francis Benjamin Johnston’s photographs – I mean, Lange and Parks for sure - but Francis Benjamin Johnston’s Hampton album where Latoya Ruby Frazier contributed a text. Or thinking through what representations of educational models mean, then and now. Or an acquisition that I did of Robert McNeill’s work and thinking through how somebody who may have been marginalized, frankly, as a black amateur photographer, who then became a professional, a commercial photographer, and thinking how does that work live in a book like Photography at MoMA? How does that work live in a gallery that we organized called Picturing America? How does that work live in another gallery about modern media? And so, one of the reasons I’m so thrilled to be at Aperture is that I’m surrounded by people who share a commitment to keep this front of mind every single day.

 And some days, you can’t point to what the tangible value of it is. But you simply know that without committing to it, you’re in fact committing to the opposite. And so, I certainly am very conscious of the privileges that have brought me to where I am, and the only way to honor that is to make sure that you both look for opportunities to complicate, expand, and encourage these things.

Aperture, for instance, has an incredibly distinguished Work Scholar Program, and a lot of current staff members had been work scholars, but we used to pay them just a small stipend. And I said we’re going to pay those people. It’s a commitment to understanding how it’s not just the work that you publish; it’s about thinking through what Aperture as an organization means in the field? And what can we do to mentor young editors, young designers, and others in the field? And this is a commitment. Having experienced that at MoMA, it is something I continue to enjoy at Aperture, with no less commitment.

Covers of the award-winning 2016 “Vision & Justice” issue of Aperture magazine

You’ve pre-empted my next question, because you’ve touched on the Work Scholars Program. I think Aperture has an important role in diversifying the field of photography criticism and removing some of those barriers for young critics, editors, or people that want to access arts publishing. So that’s great if you’re re-evaluating the Work Scholars Program in more detail.

It has taken us a little while to do. I would say big picture; what I envision Aperture to be is a nonprofit. And that as a nonprofit, it uses its publishing and web platforms as a means of getting ideas and understanding out there in the world. Also, it means is taking responsibility for where the field is and what you can do to encourage this diversity. And that is not just in your program; it’s actually in the structure of your organization. And obviously, I’m conscious of what I don’t bring to that as a human being. And so, I have to do it through my actions. And I’m grateful that it’s not only the staff, but also the board too, who feel this, and that grasp how urgent this is.

Thank you, Sarah. So, my last question, I know it’s still relatively early in your tenure. But what are your thoughts on how you wish to expand Aperture’s legacy? We've touched on this a little already. Still, I wondered if you could say what you want to bring from your many years of curating in museums to your ambition for Aperture, both as a cultural presence in New York specifically and as a cultural presence for photography internationally?

Well, I think this ties a little to my last answer - I believe that Aperture holds a singular position in the field. And that by leaning into what is singular about it and thinking through - How can we connect artists and audiences? How can we support universities and museums? How can we encourage dialogue around why photographs matter today? Then, we’re really living up to our potential. 

And it is an idea that’s bigger than art – and it approaches life. And I think that when Aperture is functioning as a real nonprofit, we are thinking through not only how do photographs matter, and why do they matter, but what can Aperture do to encourage that in the world. And when we can do that without undue concern for financial viability, but just in terms of dialogue and partnerships, this is the way. I think we can all do it together - we can be generous, be supportive, be encouraging, be critical, and in a sense that is made possible by those other instincts. And in doing that, we’re going to make a difference.

Connect with Aperture online and on its social media channels (Facebook, Twitter, Instagram). You can also follow Sarah Meister’s work with photography on Instagram @thesarahmeister

PGH Photo Fair's 2021 Image Open Call winners

"Untitled" by Rosemary Macuga Thellman

"View from the 31st Street Bridge" by EB Photography PGH

"Westinghouse Atom Smasher" by Hannah Frank

Congratulations to the winners of our annual image open call! This year, we chose three images instead of one to help promote our upcoming season of PGH Photo Fair.

Rosemary Macuga Thellman is based in Beaver, PA and is a practicing visual artist and photographer. You can see more of her work here.

EB Photography PGH is based in Pittsburgh, PA and is a practicing photographer. You can see more of her work here.

Hannah Frank is based in Pittsburgh, PA and is a practicing artist and writer. You can see more of her work here.

We're thrilled to use their photographs to promote our upcoming season. Be sure to check out each of their websites to see the rest of their work!