Call For Work

Light Art Space invites photographic artists to submit pinhole and zone plate photographs to Layered Light: Contemporary Pinhole and Zone Plate Photography.  Images made with analog and digital processes are welcome. Content and subject are up to the photographer – questions to consider are: Why are you using a pinhole camera? How does the pinhole/zone plate image support the content of the work?

Deadline to submit work: March 21st midnight Mountain time
Exhibition Dates:  April 23rd, 2021 – June 26th, 2021.

Jurors:  Nancy Spencer, Director of Pinhole Resource Inc., and Scott McMahon, Associate Professor of Art at Columbia College.

Nancy Spencer and Scott McMahon are currently writing a book on contemporary pinhole photography.

This exhibition celebrates images made in the spirit of experimentation and play and is dedicated to the late Eric Renner.

Submit here:
https://artist.callforentry.org/festivals_unique_info.php?ID=8409

Sponsored by Pinhole Resource Inc. and Freestyle Photographic Supplies

A pinhole camera is a simple camera without a lens and with a single small aperture — effectively a light-proof box with a small hole on one side. Light from a scene passes through this single point and projects an inverted image on the opposite side of the box.  Many variations of the basic pinhole camera, including ones with multiple apertures and/or zone plates, are used by artists. 

Details:

Submission Requirements:
Submissions must be pinhole/zone plate images created in the last 5 years.

Important Dates:
March 21st midnight Mountain time – deadline for submitted work
March 26th – notification of acceptance via email
April 17th – work due at Light Art Space
April 24th – opening day, an all-day reception 11 am – 6 pm observing social distancing

Entry Fee:
Entry fee: $35 for 1 – 5 images. Students $15 Use coupon code STUDENT
Maximum two entries (10 images) per artist

Jurying and Awards
First Place $250  Second Place $150
Third Place  $100 gift certificate to Freestyle Photographic Supplies

Juror Bios:
Nancy Dize Spencer, Director of Pinhole Resource Inc., a nonprofit archive and educational organization dedicated to sharing information about pinhole photography. Spencer was married to and collaborated with Eric Renner for 31 years. Renner started Pinhole Resource and passed away suddenly in April of 2020. They also co-edited Pinhole Journal, published three times a year from 1985-2006. They have given educational lectures and workshops internationally in China, Japan, Poland, France, Italy, Greece, Argentina, Germany, and Canada. Their photographs and assemblages are exhibited in major collections throughout the world. Spencer and Renner received the New Mexico Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts in 2015.
Spencer and Renner donated the Pinhole Resource Collection of 6,000 pinhole photographs by 500 photographers in 36 countries to the Palace of the Governor, New Mexico Museum of History in Santa Fe in 2012. They curated the show “Poetics of Light”, which was exhibited at the museum from April 2014 to January 2016. Spencer lives in the Mimbres Valley in southern New Mexico, east of Silver City, NM.

Scott McMahon grew up in Connecticut and now resides in Columbia Missouri where he is an Associate Professor of Art at Columbia College. He received his MFA from Massachusetts College of Art & Design in Boston, MA, and his BFA from The University of the Arts in Philadelphia, PA. Selected exhibitions include Poetics of Light, Palace of the Governors New Mexico History Museum Santa Fe, NM & National Media Museum in Bradford UK; Amerykańskie Metafory, Galeria Pusta, Katowice, Poland & Old Gallery ZPAF, Warsaw, Poland; Forgotten Attributes, Three Columns Gallery, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA; The Bioluminescent Firefly Experiment, Bridgette Mayer Gallery, Philadelphia, PA; Second Nature, The Halide Project, Philadelphia, PA; Response Time, Sol Mednick Gallery, Philadelphia, PA. McMahon’s work has been published in Pinhole Photography, Rediscovering a Historic Technique by Eric Renner, The Book of Alternative Photographic Processes by Christopher James, Anthotype by Malin Fabbri, Poetics of Light – Contemporary Pinhole Photography by Eric Renner and Nancy Spencer, Pinhole Journal, The Hand Magazine and Gum Printing – A Step-by-Step Manual, Highlighting Artists and Their Creative Practice by Christina Z. Anderson. He was a resident artist at Haystack Mountain School of Crafts in Deer Isle, Maine; iPark Artists’ Enclave in East Haddam, CT; Border Art Residency in La Union, New Mexico, and Main Street Arts in Clifton Springs, NY.

Ticul Schoolyard made with a 6 hole pinhole camera by Eric Renner