Above are installation shots of my part of the group exhibition in “Whatever Was Splendid” at the Fotofest 2010 Biennial. The gallery space is extremely large and takes over two floors of 1113 Vine Street Studios so there’s quite a number of works by each artist.

I feel incredibly fortunate to be in a group exhibition amongst such a high caliber of artists. Many people at Fotofest asked how I got to be a part of the exhibition and if I had been to Fotofest two years prior — and the simple answer is that Aaron Schuman (of SeeSaw Magazine) emailed me after seeing my work on Nymphoto and I have never been to Houston, Texas. (Thoughts on age-ism in a later post.) I met a lot of artists who attend these reviews like class reunions. To each his own.

Come opening night, Fotofest organized bus shuttles to galleries where the last destination was the reception/party at Vine Street Studios, where “Whatever Was Splendid,” is installed. I did not see the exhibition prior to that night but was so pleasantly surprised at the wonderful space and the amount of work each artist exhibited. There was so much work, it took me awhile to find where my photographs were. I even asked a staff member due to the massive crowds coming in and the maze-like space. (PS. I’m upstairs!)

During the night I received lots of great feedback from the local Houstonians as well as gallery/museum/curator folks, which really made me feel like I should give myself a good pat on the back. Asians flocked to me and felt at home with my images of the kitchen as well. It was an amazing experience! Later on the evening, the mayor made an appearance so it was glitz and glamor with body guards and cameras all hustling to the VIP tent where curators and artists were briefly introduced. There I met a bunch of photographers who I mainly know of online such as Will Steacy, Brian Ulrich, Hank Willis Thomas, Todd Hido — but also met other great people like Richard Mosse, Greg Stimac, and more. (Tema, you were missed!)

The trip was a completely new experience and overall, it was successful.

I can’t thank Aaron and Fotofest for the opportunity and all the support!

In the next few posts, I’ll write about the artists I met, thoughts on age-ism, and possibly some huge changes in my life.

Press news:

Aaron, Richard, and I were also interviewed by the Houston Public Radio early one morning. I was a bundle of nerves so coherence wasn’t on the plate but it’s great that I made it on the radio, right? Thank you Meghan Hendley for the opportunity.

Houston Public Radio, listen here.

The exhibition was also featured in The Telegraph last week.

Fotofest exhibitions is also featured in CultureMap.

Review of the exhibition as a whole from the Houston Press.

All artists in the main Fotofest exhibitions are published in the biennial catalog, which is a hefty 507 pages! It is beautifully printed and includes an introduction by Charlotte Cotton and an accompanying exhibition essay by Aaron. You can order a copy here.

Also, James Pomerantz of APhotoStudent.com announced I was the winner of his film giveaway. Thanks again, James!

I’m heading to Houston for a long weekend to immerse myself in the lots and lots of photography at Fotofest Biennial 2010. I’ll be tweeting and posting photos on my tumblr account during the few days. I’m not doing any reviews but will explore Houston and the photography festival.

If you’re heading there, please feel free to go to the opening party:

Whatever Was Splendid: New American Photographs
8pm-midnight
FotoFest at Vine Street Studios
1113 Vine Street, Houston, Texas
Curated by: Aaron Schuman, photographer, writer, lecturer, curator. Founder and editor of SeeSaw Magazine

Aaron Schuman explores the legacy and continued influence of a “thoroughly modern photographic figure,” Walker Evans. “The striking similarities between Evans’s time and our own have become all too clear,” says Mr. Schuman. “Bearing this in mind, I began to investigate his profound influence on how the United States is still responded to, regarded, recognized and represented within photography today.”

The artists in the exhibition are: Will Steacy, Michael Schmelling, Greg Stimac, Tema Stauffer, Jason Lazarus, Jane Tam, Richard Mosse, Craig Mammano, Todd Hido, Hank Willis Thomas, and RJ Shaughnessy.

Bensonhurst, Brooklyn Houses, 2008, from Foreigners in Paradise, © Jane Tam

Just wanted to update you all on some upcoming shows and what I’ve been up to.

This Friday, November 6th, I will be in a two-person exhibition with the talented Shen Wei at Nemo Design Gallery in Portland, Oregon. I will be showing ten photographs from my “Foreigners in Paradise” project.

From the website:
Nemo Design is proud to present the work of acclaimed photographers Shen Wei and Jane Tam in Reflecting China: Gendered Visions from the Diaspora. Reflecting China combines work from Shen Wei’s Chinese Sentiment Series with Jane Tam’s Foreigners in Paradise Series. The result is a collection of work that explores issues of Chinese identity, gender, diaspora, cultural memory, imagined communities, longing and belonging. Both artists have been internationally recognized for their work. Shen is the recipient of many awards and was named as one of fifteen in the “new generation of photo pioneers” by American Photo magazine in 2007 as well as, one of the PDN’s “30 New and Emerging Photographers to Watch” in 2008. Jane Tam was awarded with the Emerging Photographer Award at the Pingyao Photography Festival in China.

Reflecting China is part of the community programming for the Portland Art Museum’s China Design Now exhibit.

At the end of this year, I’m taking a trip to Hong Kong to continue my “Asleep At Sea” series. It will be about 2.5 weeks of shooting and I’m so excited for it!

After the new year, I am also showing work at the Fotofest Biennial 2010. The show, “Whatever Was Splendid,” is curated by Aaron Schuman, of Seesaw Magazine and incorporates an amazing roster of artists that I am most humbled to be included with.

From the website:
Aaron Schuman explores the legacy and continued influence of a “thoroughly modern photographic figure,” Walker Evans. “The striking similarities between Evans’s time and our own have become all too clear,” says Mr. Schuman. “Bearing this in mind, I began to investigate his profound influence on how the United States is still responded to, regarded, recognized and represented within photography today.” The artists in Mr. Schuman’s exhibition are: Will Steacy, Michael Schmelling, Greg Stimac, Tema Stauffer, Jason Lazarus, Jane Tam, Richard Mosse, Craig Mammano, Todd Hido, Hank Willis Thomas, and RJ Shaughnessy.

Reflecting China: Gendered Visions from the Diaspora
Two-Person Exhibition with Jane Tam and Shen Wei
Nemo Design Gallery
1875 SE Belmont St.Portland, OR 97214
Nov. 6 – 23, 2009
Opening Reception: Nov. 6, 2009 from 6-10pm

Whatever Was Splendid
Fotofest Biennial 2010, curated by Aaron Schuman
Vine Street Studios
1113 Vine Street
Houston, Texas
March 12 – Apr 25, 2010

Lau Fau San Temple, Hong Kong, from Asleep at Sea, © Jane Tam

I’m participating in a fundraiser to help support a project for the Vanderbilt Foundation. If you’re looking to collect art and participate in the fundraiser, be sure to purchase a ticket to the event. Lots of great work there! (See the huge list of photographers below)

Art from the Heart Benefit Fundraiser
Galleries at Calumet Photographic
22 West 22nd St
New York, NY
Thursday, September 10, 2009 – 7:00pm – 10:00pm

Participating artists include:

Joseph Cultice, David X. Prutting, Stephan Schacher, Andrew Frasz, J.p. Samedi, Lauren Fleishman, J. Matthew Riva, Chiun-Kai Shih, Mauricio Quintero, Daemian Smith, Livio Mancini, Jens Umbach, Troy Huechtker, Dawn Blackman, Stephen Mallon, Andrew Cutraro, Al-khabir Richman, Andrea Thompson, Benjamin Lowy, George Del Barrio, Leslie Dela-Vega, Mike McGregor, Emiliano Granado, Patrick Hoelck, Matthew Bogosian, Erin O’Brien, Keith Kliner, Robyn Twomey, Angela Capetta, June Kim, Antoine Verglas, Ian Spanier, Alex Verron, Jackie Neale Chadwick, Daniel Root, Elizabeth Fleming, Art Streiber, Kareem Black, Wesley Mann, Sarah Friedman, David Needleman, Morgan Shortell, Alaric Campbell, Jane Tam, Brian Finke, David Goldman, Augustus Butera, James Ransom, Jazzmine Beaulieu, Yijun Liao, Tony Gayle, Joe Fornabio, Nicole Civita, Adriana Lopetrone, Marc Mcandrews, Fabrice Tombert, Tait Simpson, Matt Salacuse, Donna Ferrato, Brian Bowen Smith, Larry Westler, Anak Navaraj, Ashton Worthington, Matt Slaby, Joe Budd, Danny Wilcox Frazier, Donna Alberico, Peter Stanglmayr

(from the Vanderbilt Foundation)
The Vanderbilt Foundation’s mission is to increase public awareness of critical arts, cultural, and human rights organizations. The Foundation does this by producing commercial-grade photography shoots with the industry‚Äôs most diverse and innovative working creatives. The VRF provides partner organizations renewed publicity through large-scale photography exhibitions, workshops, publications, and the World Wide Web.

This “Art from the Heart” Project is a fundraiser that will support the “Masters” project in Cambodia.

This fall, The Vanderbilt Republic Foundation (VRF), in an unprecedented partnership with Arn Chorn-Pond and Cambodian Living Arts, will devote four weeks to rigorously documenting the lives of these Cambodian performing masters in a manner their stories deserve and with an approach that honors and celebrates their significance in our world. Acclaimed large-format portrait photographer Geroge Del Barrio will lead a unique team of American artists deeply inspired by and connected to Arn and the CLA’s narrative. The team will craft life-sized portraits of the masters, their students, their instruments and the world they inhabit, all at the highest professional standard. They’ll print and present this work at life-size, to fully describe the extreme realities of these survivors‚Äîin traveling exhibitions throughout the world and internet. A higher-education lecture series, based on this body of work, is planned. And in addition, a feature-length, broadcast-quality film of the entire process will be created, focusing on the perspective of the masters as they collaborate with the American team. What will transpire is a beautiful story about the arts renaissance in Cambodia today and with your help we can make this project a reality.

Grandmother at Fort Greene Park, 2007, © Jane Tam

My grandparents on my father’s side of the family were the people who brought so many of my family members from Hong Kong to America in the 1970s and after. My grandmother used most of her savings to immigrate to the states. She helped my mother’s side of the family immigrate to the states in the late 80s and 90s as well. It’s amazing how the Tam family as well as the Yeung family are so indebted to this one woman. My grandmother had a slew of medical problems in the past but somehow her fighting power was always strong and she fought it like a tiger. She traveled to many countries with my grandfather, went parasailing, took photographs and pet a live tiger, went gambling every weekend or day at Atlantic City, and talked back to anybody in her way. She was a stubborn lady with quite a temper but she always knew to treat her grandchildren differently, like many grandparents.

As I’ve written in a few posts before, I’ve been busy with a lot of family issues and it was mainly the fact that in these past two months, I’ve been in and out of the hospital with many family members. We have a large family and even with family politics, we are all very filial and respectful. I can’t say I was particularly close with my Grandmother growing up but in the past 2-3 years of photographing her every few months, I started to develop a bond. It’s sad to realize that our relationship was so short but as least I have a few memories to hold on to. My grandmother passed away last Friday with her whole family by her side. She went peacefully and we all know she’s lived a vibrant and great life. She can now gamble all she wants wherever she may be.

It’s hard to maintain a professional blog without being personal especially since I am very attached to my family project. With all the sorrow and sadness of our loss, I am also happy to invite you all to the Nymphoto shows, one of which opens this Wednesday. Funny how life works; such polar opposites of emotions.

Nymphoto Presents @ Sasha Wolf

A group show exhibiting compelling collection of work by contemporary women photographers from across the globe. While diverse in content, these works convey the complexity of the female gaze – the woman behind the camera. The photographs ignite a spirit by addressing a diversity of issues, which inevitably calls into question: what is feminine.

The exhibit features work by:

Jennifer Boomer, Nina B√ºsing Corvallo, Rona Chang, Livia Corona, Katrina d’Autremont, Jen Davis, Lizzie Gorfaine, Candace Gottschalk, Victoria Hely-Hutchinson, Megan Maloy, Tiana Markova-Gold, Debora Mittelstaedt, Maria Passarotti, Alex Prager, Beatrix Reinhardt, Anna Skladmann, Jane Tam, Malou van Breevoort, Corinne Vionnet, Sophia Wallace, & Susan Worsham

Exhibition opens May 23rd through June 6, 2009.

Please join us for the artist reception May 28, 2009 6-8 p.m. at Sasha Wolf Gallery in New York.

*Psst: We also have an opening reception and book launch on May 6, 2009 at Sasha Wolf Gallery for Nymphoto: Conversations Volume I.

The difference between Nymphoto and some other collectives is that we are a close knit community of just a few members. (Our meetings run hours long.. food keeps us sane.) We strive to keep each other motivated and it’s especially valuable to me since I was fresh out of college when I was asked to join. Although we are committed to promote women working in photography and creating a voice for them, we are mostly artists too. We have work that wants to be shown and recognized.We have full time jobs but are motivated to keep our goals and intentions going strong.

I’m pleased to announce Nymphoto’s newest projects.

We’re publishing our first book! The Conversations in book form! Also, we are happy to collaborate with gallery owner and director, Sasha Wolf, to put on a physical exhibition coinciding with the book. The title of the book and show is simple called,”Nymphoto: Conversations Volume I.” Join us on May 6, 2009 at the gallery for our book launch and opening reception.

Ladies! We’re also doing a Call for Entries for an group exhibition following the book launch exhibition. Deadline is April 7th. Please go to www.nymphoto.com for details and to submit. We’re looking for the best in contemporary photography by women so please pass the word on.

exterior shot from PIP website

a shot of the exhibition via Jamason Chen

Since I couldn’t make the cross-global trip to China for the Pingyao International Photography Festival, I made sure my awesome curator, Jamason Chen, take some photos of the event and whatnot. Seems like I also won an award there! My project, “Foreigners in Paradise” has won the award of a Ping Yao International Photographic Festival 2008 Emerging Photographer.

Stalking the festival website, looking for more information and using google translate, I finally found my name amongst the news article (2008映像杯中国平遥国际摄影大展新人奖: 谭珍玲 with 10 other talented artists~).