Lois Greenfield - 2009
Lois Greenfield dreamt of being a National Geographic photographer, but her chosen landscapes are actually quite different.
For over 30 years Greenfeld has photographed dancers, developing a figurative language focused on the human body’s shapes and expressions. She does not treat her subjects as choreographed ‘reality,’ rather seeking to create confounding studies of the human form in motion. "I am not interested in capturing something I’ve seen or planned," she says, "I want to explore the potential of the elusive moment; to confound the beholder by presenting what the eyes clearly see and the brain wants to refute."
Greenfeld started to photograph in the 1960s and dreamed of a career at National Geographic. She graduated in anthropology and film direction from Brandeis University in 1970 and began work as a freelance photographer for a Boston arts publication, learning photography as she went along.Her first assignment covering a dance performance was a double challenge; she knew less about dance than photography. However, when she returned to New York in 1973 Greenfeld had learned to photograph bodies in abrupt and unpredictable motion, and become passionate about photographing dance.In 1980 she got her first proper studio and the powerful flashguns needed to photograph dancers in controlled conditions. This resulted in the book Breaking Bounds, published in 1992. "I have spent 25 years of my photographic career exploring movement and its expressive potential. My inspiration has always been photography´s ability to stop time and reveal what the naked eye can’t see," says Greenfeld.
1949
Selected exhibitions:1988: Musee de L´Elysee, Lausanne, Switzerland.1992: International Center of Photography, NYC.1994: New Zealand Festival of the Arts.2001: Center of Contemporary Art, St. Louis.2003: Biennale De L´Image, Nancy, France.2006: Resonating Fields — Southeast Museum of Photography, Daytona Beach.2007: Art Photo Site Gallery, Tokyo, Japan2007: Bunkamura Gallery, Tokyo, Japan2006: Saitama Arts Theatre, Saitama, Japan2007: Gallery Orchard, Nagoya, Japan.2008: Celestial Bodies / Infernal Souls - Hallmark Museum of Contemporary Photography.
Books:
Airborne: The New Dance Photography of Lois Greenfield, 1998, Thames & Hudson, Ltd. England; Chronicle Books, USA
Breaking Bounds: The Dance Photography of Lois Greenfield, William A. Ewing, 1992, Thames & Hudson, Ltd. England & France; Chronicle Books, USA; JICC, Japan.