Documentary photographer to give memorial lecture

Leading American photographer Catherine Opie, who specialises in confronting images of portraiture and landscape, delivers the 2011 Peter Turner Memorial Lecture at the College of Creative Arts, Wellington, on August 3.

Ms Opie, who since 2001 has been Professor of Photography at University of California, Los Angeles, specialises in documentary photography that examines communal. sexual and cultural identity.

Her photographs often combine portraiture with investigations of the contemporary American urban landscape. Her best-known series are large-scale colour depictions of the California gay community, portraits of friends and family life and include her now famous self-portrait that celebrates the beauty of lesbian motherhood.

More recently her images have explored social communities such as surfers in Malibu, ice fishers in Minnesota, and young American high school football players –portraits of young American men framed by the sporting landscapes in which ideas of emerging masculinity are played out.

Head of the School of Fine Arts, Associate Professor Heather Galbraith, says Ms Opie’s work moves from images of the human body to the framework of the cityscape, linked together by a concern for the nature and quality of communities, the politics of identity and the relationships between people and the places they create.

In 2008 a mid-career survey of her work entitled Catherine Opie: American Photographer, was on view at the Solomon R. Guggenheim museum in New York. Her work has also been exhibited at the MCA in Chicago, the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York, the Photographer’s Gallery London and the Centre d’Art Contemporain in Geneva.

Ms Opie’s work has been presented in Wellington, most recently in the exhibition Tender is the Night at City Gallery Wellington, which was curated by Ms Galbraith.

“This is a rare and privileged opportunity to hear from an artist working at the leading edge of photographic practice, “ Ms Galbraith says.

The annual Peter Turner lecture was established in memory of the late Peter Turner-esteemed photographic historian, curator, editor, publisher and teacher who spent the last 15 years of his life living and working in Wellington. Associated with the memorial lecture is the Peter Turner Scholarship in documentary photography, which is awarded annually to a top photography student, wishing to pursue postgraduate studies.

Ms Opie’s lecture at Massey’s Wellington campus is at 6pm on Wednesday August 3, in the theatrette of the Museum Building, Buckle St.

She has been in New Zealand for six weeks as an international visiting artist at the University of Auckland.

Attendees are advised to arrive early to secure a seat.