Fran Forman
Hanging out and being friends with people who are smarter than you has always been a helpful, if not selfish, act. Luckily, I have several good friends that tolerate my practice of doing this. Their wisdom, talent, and mindset can help elevate one’s own way of thinking and working, and this is especially true of a friend and talent like Fran Forman. Since the day we met, I knew that there was something special about her. There’s a very natural way that she can ease a person into feeling like they are one of the gang, simply because that’s how she is and how she approaches others. There is no ego, no predilection for bragging or dropping names, and certainly no making anyone feel left out. There’s a humble and giving attitude that she carries with her everywhere she goes, and it’s clear as to why she is so sought after as an educator and workshop instructor.
I’ve known Fran for several years - not a lot by most standards, but they have been rewarding at every turn. What is most especially wonderful is seeing someone who I knew to make great images, continue to grow and transform her already well-hewn work ethic into something different, but with the same magical aesthetic that heralds her intent. The conversation that we have taken part in here takes our familiarity with one another to a deeper place in discussing the creative process and is a prime example that illustrates how one achieves a lifetime of work and success in the art world. You would do very well to seek Fran’s guidance, and that is exactly what has happened here in this extensive interview with a true master of her craft.
Bio -
Fran’s photo paintings have been exhibited widely, both locally and internationally, and are in many private collections as well the permanent collections of the Museum of Fine Arts Boston, the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum (Washington, DC), the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, The Grace Museum (Texas), the Sunnhordland Museum (Norway), Western Carolina University Fine Art Museum, the Comer Collection at the University of Texas, and the County Down Museum (Northern Ireland).
Fran’s 2nd major monograph, The Rest Between Two Notes, with 110 color plates and 224 pages is published by Unicorn Publishing and available March 2020.
Escape Artist: The Art of Fran Forman was published by SchifferBooks and was selected as one of the Best PhotoBooks of 2014 by Elizabeth Avedon and won First Place in an international competition.
Fran’s work is featured in the books Photoshop Masking and Compositing, Contemporary Cape Cod Artists: People and Places, BETA Developments in Photography, and the magazines AAP, Internationales Magazin fur Sinnliche Fotografie (Fine Art Photo), The Hand, Blur, and Shadow and Light. Monographs of Fran’s solo exhibitions were published by Pucker Gallery in 2018, 2016, and 2014. She was invited to be an Artist in Residence at Holsnoy Kloster, Norway, The Studios of Key West, and The Millay Colony for the Arts. Additionally, she is often asked to juror and curate photo exhibitions.
Some of Fran’s solo exhibitions were at The Fox Talbot Museum, Lacock Abbey, England, The Massachusetts State House (The Griffin Museum of Photography), AfterImage Gallery (Dallas), the University of North Dakota, Galeria Photo/Graphica (Mexico), and the Pucker Gallery (Boston), as well as numerous group shows. In the past decade, Fran has won numerous significant awards and prizes; most recently, first place from the Julia Margaret Cameron awards and three awards (First Place, Gold and Silver) from PX3 Prix de la Photographie, Paris. She also won the second prize from the World Photography Gala Award (out of over 8000 entries) in People and Portraits; in 2010, she won 1st place in Collage for the Lucie Foundation’s International Photo Awards (IPA). She was also a finalist for four straight years in PhotoLucida’s Critical Mass.
Fran is represented by AfterImage Gallery (Dallas), Pucker Gallery (Boston), SusanSpiritus Gallery (California), and Galeria Photo/Graphica (Mexico).
She is an Affiliated Scholar at the Women’s Studies Research Center at Brandeis University, a recipient of several grants and Artist Residencies, and teaches advanced photo-collage internationally.
Fran studied art and sociology at Brandeis University, received an MSW in psychiatric social work, and then an MFA from Boston University. She resides in the New England area.
Interview -
Michael Kirchoff: Hello Fran, it’s a real treat for me to be able to conduct this interview with a stellar photographic artist who is also a valued friend, such as yourself. That said, there is still so much that I do not know and I’m eager to discuss a few topics, as well as get to know your work a little deeper and find out a bit more of what makes you tick. I’ll simply start at the start and ask how you got into the arts. Was it photography first, or some other form of image-making that struck a chord in you?
Fran Forman: Hi Michael, I’m honored, and I welcome having this conversation with you, who I first had the pleasure to meet in New York (or was it in China?) in 2011.
MK: It was in New York, but China quickly followed a couple of months later.
FF: I’m a late-comer to photography. I sometimes say that I came in through the back door. All during my childhood, I was drawing, much to the chagrin of my teachers who complained that my text-books and school papers were covered with drawings. Mostly, I drew faces. For my thirteenth birthday, I asked my parents for a subscription to Look Magazine, which I thought had better photographs than in Life Magazine, and I copied them obsessively. I remember sitting in front of our little black and white TV and just drawing all the time.
When I was preparing a portfolio for admission to an MFA program in Graphic Design, I was working at MIT (cleaning the media lab in exchange for access to the equipment). I spent hours in the darkroom, often all night, in fact, and that’s when I discovered the magic of photography. I was especially excited by the work of Ralph Eugene Meatyard, Duane Michals, Jerry Uelsmann and the Pictorialists (and still am). My early photographs were weird high-contrast or blurry experiments using masks, movement, and sequences, and I came to the conclusion that I could express myself better in photography than in my drawings.
But all that was put on hold over the next fifteen years while I worked as a graphic designer and raised my daughters. From graphic design, I came to understand, among many things, the value of economy in design, the emotional impact of a powerful image, and the intersection of fine art, psychology, physical space, and commerce.
It wasn’t until the late 80s that I began to understand that the computer could be more than just a souped-up typewriter and that one could draw pictures on it. Transferring my pencils to the mouse, I began to digitally draw and ‘paint’. Despite my technophobia, I got hooked...the mouse became my new drawing tool! The colors were limited, the screen was tiny, the pixels were big and clunky, and printing technology hadn’t caught up with the software. In 1992 I began using pre-layers Photoshop to create collaged images for my family, for small animations and for CD-ROMs. I was lucky to have some wonderful opportunities designing CD-ROMs that incorporated my photography and ‘painting’ with archival materials from the Jack Kerouac Estate and from the Library of Congress. Eventually, print technology began to catch up with the rapidly-expanding software, and I began to print my images on paper without the threat of fugitive colors.
MK: So while working as a graphic designer you were learning the ropes of photography. Do you feel that your background in design is what helped shape how you make images today? Being someone who conceptualizes and quite literally designs and builds photographs digitally, it seems like this was a logical transition for you.
FF: Absolutely! As a designer working with a client, you attempt to visually and succinctly express an emotion, an idea, or a product. The design must be evocative and strong enough to grab the attention of the viewer while visually conveying the message. In addition to designing for print and for signage systems, I worked a lot with typography, which I love. Each choice of font, for example, is deliberate, suggesting an idea or conveying an emotion. And of course, the spacing between letters and lines (the negative space) is as critical as the letters themselves. This certainly influences the way I create images now, with a reverence for economy, symmetry, craftsmanship, composition, negative and those in-between spaces (note the gentle plug for my book: The Rest Between Two Notes, now available!).
In the early 90s, as I moved from architectural and print design to the world of digital, I began to incorporate photographic montages into my typography and designs. Images became part of the digital content (e.g., navigation, buttons, hyper-linked books, banners, illustrations, animations). The images were meant to suggest ideas about the content without being so obvious as to be merely illustrative. As the Art Director and sole designer of various CD-ROMs, hyper-linked books, and web sites, I was fortunate to have opportunities to keep up with the changes in technology...which is quite something for a techno-phobe. For AOL-Time Warner in the early ‘aughts, I designed several websites devoted to the African diaspora; each site included original graphics and illustrations to supplement the daily content. It wasn’t lost on me or anyone else that my real interest was in creating the images.
MK: So then it’s quite clear where the inspiration to begin making photographs began, not to mention working digitally. I’m wondering at what point you started taking your photography seriously as an art form, and was there ever traditional means used to create your imagery? In addition, was it anywhere close to the type of work we see today?
FF: I love this question, Michael, because it allowed me to go back and find my early childhood drawings (thanks, Mom, for keeping them!) and for photographic work from the 70s, from before I entered the work-force as a graphic designer. I shouldn’t be surprised to discover that, lo and behold, there are indeed similarities in those early drawings and prints and what I’m doing now. Way back then, in my early photography, I was already creating narratives, usually with a solitary figure, somewhat enigmatic, in slightly decaying environments. The figures were often in movement or blurred, and it was clear then that I was frustrated by what I thought was the arbitrary limitations of stopped time and the image’s frame. I also experimented with double exposures and sequences, attempting to create little ‘films’ of still images. Even then, I was fascinated by composition and the geometric structure of an image and the relation of dark to light. I remember spending hours, often all night, in the darkroom at MIT, trying to get the best mid-tones and the blackest blacks. In 1976, I had my first exhibit at a gallery in Cambridge, but I knew I couldn’t support myself this way, so, as I mentioned, I put it all aside for over a decade.
I began experimenting with digital collage not long after Photoshop was released. Although I made little photo montages for my family and friends (and the yearly holiday card), I was working for clients creating images for on-line and CD-ROMs. When printing technology began to catch up, I started to print my images on color-fast papers. This was around the early ‘aughts, and I began to show my prints and was delighted that I was being taken seriously as a fine artist.
MK: I suppose that’s exactly why I like asking questions about our past works and examining where we started, versus now. I find it interesting to look back over time and see the cause and affect our process and direction have taken us. Is this something you would normally do, and do you think that it might ultimately create some conflict or change in how or why you may produce your art? Should the memory of past art inform thoughtful consideration in the making of our current works?
FF: I don’t spend a lot of time looking back at or reflecting on earlier work. But I see that there is a through-line - certain elements that are consistent over time - storytelling, my interest in the passage of time, metaphor, relationships and disconnection, portals, light and shade, color and composition, my interest in social history and art history, blurring the boundary between fact and fiction - but mostly my process is intuitive and my image-making is reflective of my life at the moment. I don’t spend a lot of time trying to understand everything I do, yet I think there’s always an arc determined by the artist’s life experiences and circumstances. [Note: I recently found a drawing I did when I was, I think, in 6th grade. It’s a drawing of a slave woman standing at an auction block, surrounded by jeering men in 18th-century garb. Having grown up below the Mason-Dickson Line, I was well aware of and obviously troubled by our history.]
For example, I certainly see that my current work is unsentimental and darker, my settings often barren and decaying, my figures more solitary. It’s a truism that we don’t live in a vacuum and life seeps into one’s art. How can one not respond to changes in life’s circumstances, to loss and existential threats in our personal lives and to threats to our democratic institutions and to our planet? As the famously taciturn Edward Hopper said, art is the “outward expression of an inner life”, and my inner life is indeed concerned with existential threats. My current work, more interior and contemplative, reflects this. Perhaps it is for this reason that I seem to be gravitating towards intense chiaroscuro and vibrant bursts of color, and I’m now heavily influenced by the stylized cinematography of film noir, the abstracted settings and solitary figures of Hopper, and the constructed and ambiguous narratives of Gregory Crewdson.
MK: I definitely hear what you are saying. Constant examination of our past seems a little overbearing, though nothing wrong with looking back on occasion. On that note, you mention the darker tone so much of your work has taken on in recent days, and how our current societal climate is bringing these dramatic scenes to the forefront of your imagery. Was this a conscious change, and do you see your role as an artist that as one who should respond to these changes? Is this one of the things that drives you as a creator?
FF: No, it is not a conscious choice. And I don’t want to be all preachy and say that the artist must respond to events outside of her inner life. It’s just that, for me, everything that I read and observe and experience goes into the minestrone that is my mind, and it gets reinterpreted visually, albeit unconsciously. I agree with this statement that Hopper wrote in a letter to Lewis Mumford: “The direction one’s work takes is the inevitable concomitant of the painter’s individuality...and not a matter of conscious choice.”
MK: Earlier you’d mentioned some of the recurring elements that appear in your photographs. This is a related two-part question - What is it that you get out of creating photographs? Is there an overriding theme in your work that you feel best represents you as an artist?
FF: (Answering the second question first). I’ve never been satisfied with the limitations of the imposed frame of a photograph or the frozen moment in time. Nor was I concerned with recording actual events. In my earliest photographs, I attempted to stage scenes: of figures departing the frame, or in strange locations, or blurred, or of sequences in movement. If I had been a better draftsperson, I would have painted, and in fact, my work has been referred to as ‘photo-painting’, which I think is as good a description as any. My images aren’t representations of a specific moment in time but rather of altered fragments from many moments, many places.
Over these past forty years (yikes), I have been either constructing or staging scenes, creating or manipulating images, shooting, scanning, analog and digital. For me, the click of the shutter is just the beginning of the process, because it’s the manipulation of the still image that I most enjoy. (First in the darkroom, and since the late 80s, on the computer.) This is where my ‘inner painter’ comes to play.
Which brings me to your first question: what do I get out of creating photographs? It’s just that: manipulating reality to create a new world, a different visual narrative that, by juxtaposing realism with illusion, could defy the laws of physics, truth with illusion. Creating new images out of fragments of photographs is a little like being a master puppeteer, I suppose, or maybe a stage designer. And recreating an image to suggest that it just might be real - until a closer look - that is the challenge and the delight. It’s this part of the process that is my joy, my salvation, my obsession, and often, my tormentor.
MK: Honestly, I think this is an extremely interesting fact about you. What you are saying, at least as far as your work goes, you’re a bit of a control freak. Not a put down of course, but I personally don't think of you to be that sort of person in real life. Any ideas on why you stray away from reality in making your imagery? Perhaps there is too much reality and we all just need a story or an escape from time to time?
FF: When I’m constructing an image, I allow the process to dominate and I follow my instincts, working intuitively but obsessed with details. I work alone in a semi-darkened room, just me and my music and an occasional non-human companion, often unaware of the passage of time. I suppose I am obsessive about my space and practice. But I can’t always predict what the final image will be. I welcome surprises and serendipitous mistakes, often learning from them. I’ve learned over time that my intuition (and education) is a good guide. So no, I don’t think I’m totally in control. But my unconscious is.
But you’re right, outside of work, my ‘real life’ persona is, shall we say, rather ‘devil may care’. And anyone who has been to my house will tell you that as far as the ‘domestic arts’ are concerned, I am the opposite of a control freak!
MK: Ah, I see. I think we can all get into our own work with that obsessive thought process. Probably part of our collective artmaking identity. So then, with themes like obsession, serendipity, surprise, and intuition all at play, what is it that makes for a successful photograph?
FF: Yes, I agree, it is part of the collective artmaking identity and process, for all artists, not just visual artists.
Like any piece of art, a photograph should attempt to create an emotional connection with the viewer. It also can pose questions and teach us something. It might help us understand the moment we live in. Every photograph, every work of art, tells a story that’s been told before. But a great one tells that story in a different way. It’s the syntax.
A poet friend describes a great work of art as something that brings him to tears, of joy or sorrow. What he means is that art is where science or logic ends, it’s what makes you feel something, even if you don’t know why.
MK: I would imagine then that as you are building your images, there is a certain feeling you get as you move through the various stages. Like being guided by some unseen force that takes you to that image of emotional connection.
FF: The ‘force’ you refer to is some sort of ‘zone’, I think - that state of almost unconsciousness which is a form of bliss, and I love being in that place of emotional connection with the images. But most of my process is pure grinding, tedious, painstaking work. The ‘bliss’, if it happens at all, only happens when it all starts to come together.
MK: You’ve already mentioned some aspects of what inspires you in the creation of your work, but I wonder how you know when you are done with a particular image? Are there ever alternate images born out of the same idea that you sit with over time, before deciding which one has realized your vision the most accurately?
FF: Whenever I give a talk or a presentation, I’m invariably asked that same question: “how do you know when you’re done”. My kind of image-making is really more like a painter’s, in that it’s made from lots of pieces which I move around until I’m satisfied (or sick of it). I suppose painters, writers, and musicians are also asked “how do you know when it’s done”, too. We all would answer the question the same way: “It’s done when I can’t think of anything more to improve it.” A non-answer, to be sure. Often, I think an image is done and I feel so damn proud of myself as I consider this new ‘masterpiece’. And the next day, I look at it again and see what a disaster it is. I might try to rework it or cannibalize parts of it or simply abandon it altogether.
There is that rare time, however, and I stress the word “rare”, that I begin working on an image and it comes together within a day or two, and I just know it’s right; this may be that moment of bliss we just talked about. Other people may not agree with me, but I just feel that it’s exactly as it should be. But most often, I work and rework and let it sit and then look and rework and let it sit and look at it...ad nauseum... And either abandon it or flatten it and move on to a new project. Sometimes I show an image in process to a few trusted artist friends, not all of whom are photographers, for their response.
MK: Now that I’m understanding your creative process so much more, and have seen a new direction in your imagery recently, I think it’s time we discussed a new book you have coming out quite soon. I have your first book, but I know that this new one addresses the latest aesthetic you’ve created within these different worlds imagined for your images. How long have you been working on the latest works for the book, and what has the process of doing a second monograph been like, now that you’ve gone through it before?
FF: The new book, The Rest Between Two Notes, has been a mammoth project (as these things typically are). Published by Unicorn, which has a small art imprint, it includes around 110 images. The title is from a poem by Rilke and refers to those ‘moments between moments’ that so many of my current images suggest. Similar to the production of my first book, I was given about six months to complete the process before heading off to press. Those six months are extremely stressful where I rarely come up for air.
Without a doubt, the most challenging part of the process is the culling, editing, sequencing - and this process is especially difficult since I don’t create my images as part of various organized series. I did understand that certain psychological and overarching themes are consistent in my later work, all suggesting that quiet space - the momentary fragment - between day and night, absence and arrival, past and present, reality and illusion, connection and solitary states. This was the thematic approach that provided the structure to the book.
As for the contributions from various writers...I’ve always believed that any art is a conversation between the maker and the viewer. I contacted a few dozen people who had previously commented on my work and asked if they would like to contribute their thoughts about a particular image or two. Once I narrowed down the images to a “manageable” 110 or so, I put up a secure web page where they could select an image that resonated with them in some way. Some wrote stories or poems inspired by an image, others wrote short essays or just personal responses, and their words are adjacent to their selected images. The contributing writers are artists from various disciplines, architects, scientists, novelists, lawyers, doctors, teachers, poets, and a man released from prison after serving 32 years. I am touched and grateful to them all!
Even before I was approached by Unicorn, I envisioned a book that was in itself an object...a beautiful object integrating image and text. I envisioned a more complicated layout that would seamlessly integrate text, format and color without sacrificing the dominance of the image. I sketched a few mock-up page spreads and, after interviewing a few designers, hired a brilliant woman who understood and could interpret my vision. In addition to her and my printer’s reps, many trusted friends helped with all aspects of the book, such as the myriad technical details.
My first book, Escape Artist, was generously published by Schiffer in 2014. I designed the book and invited a wonderful New England poet, Michelle Blake, to write ‘introductions’ for each chapter as well as a long prose poem for the last chapter. You can’t imagine how thrilled I was when the Fox Talbot Museum, Lacock Abbey installed an exhibition of all the large-scale prints along with each line from the poem. The book also included several essays from prominent artists about photo collage, its history, and process.
MK: The collaborative aspect of asking so many people to comment on your work, in addition to the technical aspects of bookmaking is an eye-opening experience, I would imagine. I’m quite fascinated with the idea of these “in-between” moments that you create, and I wonder if after getting so many passive, general, and critical viewpoints about your work, if it has changed your own view of the work at all? I mean, getting a whole lot of perspective from many other artistic individuals must have been overwhelming. Approximately how many others have writing in the book, and did you contribute as well?
FF: Some years ago, at the opening of my exhibition in Colorado, I noticed a young boy walking through the gallery with his grandmother. They stopped at each image, discussing and riffing off of each other’s interpretation. I remember thinking, ‘this is what we artists hope for...to inspire a connection not only with our art but with each other.’
For this book, I wasn’t looking for critiques or reviews of the images; to the contrary, I wanted the contributing writer to hopefully feel sufficiently inspired to riff on an image.
There are thirty-three writers who are ‘in conversation’ with the images. Some have written poems or short stories inspired by their chosen images. Some have written short essays on topics as varied as Jungian psychology or physics. Some have responded to the structure of an image. Some express a feeling generated by an image. Each brings their own individuality into their interpretations, musings, prose and poetry.
Did I contribute?: I wrote the Afterword, which I obsessed over for weeks.
MK: Since this is your second book, and a departure aesthetically from previous works, did you feel it necessary to make an effort to design a book that is equal in that departure?
FF: Just like every choice of medium should reflect the message, a book’s design should reflect its content. It was a challenge to integrate image, text, and design while maintaining the overarching and somewhat obscure theme of “the spaces between,” and I think the design succeeded by presenting a logical hierarchy of content.
The layout, typography, choice of colors, sequencing, and organization into five distinct but related ‘chapters’ are all deliberately created and work metaphorically as well as visually. Each chapter suggests and is titled as a different ‘between’ state; the middle of the five chapters, the third, is slightly different than the others and suggests a gallery of portraits in a museum, complete with wallpaper (which I actually shot in various museums around the country) integrated into each portrait. A wallpaper pattern also graces the endpapers, furthering the metaphor.
My hope was to produce a stunning, well-crafted and beautifully produced visual object that reflects and expounds on each image and the corresponding texts.
MK: In creating a book or body of work like this, it takes vision, a quite certain decisiveness in choosing images for sequencing, and the wisdom to know when you are done. But, how do you know if you’re ever really done with a specific body of work? Do you ever go back to revisit images or collections to improve upon what you felt was previously finished?
FF: I don’t make a conscious decision to ‘complete’ one body of work so as to move onto another, nor do I believe one ever really knows if one is done with a specific body of work. My work tends to evolve slowly from one thing to another, with a vague through-line that might only become apparent after months or even years.
As for revisiting old images to improve upon them...I believe this is the curse of any artist...the desire to return to earlier work to “improve” it, to never feel as if you’ve completed a body of work satisfactorily. So I try not to look backwards.
MK: Instead of looking back now, how about present-day Fran? Anyone working in an artistic field has matured and grown over time. Is there anything you’ve discovered lately that you’d like people to know about you or your creative process?
FF: These days, I give myself time to ruminate, to lie fallow, to experiment with other media, to study other artists, to have a life occasionally far removed from making art. I feel less pressure to ‘prove myself’, to measure my worth by the recognition of others. Certainly, there are moments - all too frequently - when the north star feels elusive. But those moments don’t paralyze me, perhaps because I’ve come to realize that the process isn’t linear, that the urge to create ebbs and flows.
My current montages tend to be darker, moodier, and simpler, although I’m still living in the world of color, light, shadow, and geometry. My images continue to invite the viewer to construct a narrative and to suggest those luminal spaces, the moment between moments, the wistful figure in contemplation or between connections. But I’m also drawn more to a geometric construction and an occasional ambiguous source of light. Despite the narrative quality in my work, they’re becoming more abstract, and by that I mean more aligned with space, structure and shape.
This spring I’ll be creating images for a video projection for a choral ensemble dedicated to works of women composers. This is my very meager attempt to bridge two of the media that I love; someday I would love the opportunity to channel my inner William Kentridge.
I’m incredibly honored to be accepted as an Artist in Residence at The Millay Colony for the Arts (the estate of poet/activist Edna St Vincent Millay) this summer. I’ll be there for a month, and these opportunities, meeting artists of various disciplines, often lead to new and unanticipated creative directions. I hope to use the month to explore the culturally rich and beautiful surroundings, to prepare work for upcoming solo exhibitions, to experiment and play with other media, and especially to enjoy meeting talented artists from around the world.
MK: Perfect timing on mentioning your working with these composers for a side project. My next question was going to ask you if you have any other creative pursuits, and if so, do they also inform aspects of your photographic work?
FF: I love making assemblages and I dabble in mixed media. Depending on my frame of mind, I might use encaustic wax to layer images onto various substrates, or I might use cut-up discarded images, various objects, vintage papers, glue, acrylic, paints and/or cold wax. Sometimes I build little weird dioramas into small boxes (the cigar store owner near my house is always happy to see me). I have a separate room in my house (thank you, kids, for leaving the nest) which is a chaotic mess, but to which I escape when I need a break from moving pixels around. This summer I’ll be teaching a workshop in mixed media and collage - the analog way.
MK: How wonderful to hear about you taking on an analog perspective in your work again. A bit of a throwback to your earlier graphic design days, before the computer took over, I’m sure. Ok, Fran, I just wanted to touch upon a couple of final things here. The first one is, in speaking to future generations of photographers, do you have any words of wisdom to those setting out to make their mark in the photographic (or art) world?
FF: Think of yourselves as Artists, not just as photographers. A camera is a tool, but it’s the thinking behind the image that tells a story. Although you want to make a connection with the viewer, you will discover that making art can be restorative, that the simple creation of it can be good for the soul.
And to be an artist, you must develop visual literacy and engagement: be curious, educated, socially aware, and hopefully compassionate towards others and our non-human companions. Our planet is at a tipping-point now, as is our democracy. Do whatever you can to illuminate the issues, participate in ways that can repair the damage. Get involved. Vote! Study history; look at the work of other artists, not just photographers; go to the opera and theatre, to museums; travel to places unknown; listen to good music; read poetry; see movies created by the best directors and cinematographers. Don’t be afraid to cross boundaries, to transgress. Be literate, and read, read, read. Read good fiction, non-fiction, history, science. Read newspapers and journals. Read the best writers. Read periodicals like The New Yorker and The Atlantic. Do the research! Think critically and analytically. Learn to discern truth from misinformation.
MK: Lastly, to wrap things up nicely, What can we expect to see from you in the future? Any new projects that may see the light of day soon? How about when the new book is released, and what that might entail?
FF: The Rest Between Two Notes is now available! It can be ordered at your favorite indie bookstore, on Amazon or at photo-eye. My first U.S. launches and signings are scheduled here:
The Strand in New York, March 12, where I will be ‘in conversation with’ Katrin Eismann: link here
photo-eye in Santa Fe, March 18: link here
Trident Books in Boston March 25: link here
As to what lies ahead...making new pictures, playing with different media, a month-long artist residency, travel, hanging out with friends and family, campaigning for my candidates in November, and trying to stay optimistic. In other words, the same old same old.
You can find more of Fran's work on her website here.
All photographs, ©Fran Forman.
