Collective Conciousness
Maybe I am in an optimistic mood but it feels like these trying times are ushering in a new era of collaboration and collective thinking the likes of which we have not seen in quite some time. It seems like everywhere I look photographers of every ilk are pooling their resources, creating community and generally eschewing the competitive, cagey, norm that defined our industry in the past. I’ve mentioned both Fjord Photo and The Exposure Project recently but here are a few other collective endeavors you should be aware of.
Dream Boats’, Adam Golfer, Daniel Shea, Joe Leavenworth, and T.J. Proechel describe themselves as an “agency specializing in fine art and editorial work” stating that they “run the project collaboratively”. With a growing client list, limited edition print sales, and its second group show coming up in April, Dream Boats seems to be onto something good. They also keep a nice blog here.
Daniel Shea of Dream Boats
POC or Piece of Cake was founded in 2002 by French photographer Charles Fréger but with the launch of its North American branch seems to be growing in power and popularity. POC’s “raison d’être is to enable the artists to interact as they create, produce and distribute their works”. Comprised of the POC Workshops which give members an opportunity to meet and discuss the state of their art and POC Editions which is a member managed publishing venture, POC provides ample opportunity for exchanging ideas and developing markets for their work.
Christian Patterson of POC: Bloody Snow
Nymphoto is a collective of women artists made up of Nina Buesing Corvallo, Candace Gottschalk, Melanie Oswald, Maria Passarotti, Rona Chang and Jane Tam. By “providing online exhibitions, curating group shows, creating collective publications and offering an open forum for artistic discourse”, Nymphoto fosters community for female photo based artists. Nymphoto is currently hosting an online auction to benefit the relief effort in Haiti featuring photographs by Keliy Anderson-Staley, Nina Büsing Corvallo, Jeff Cate, Rona Chang, Cameron Goodyear, Candace Gottschalk, Laura Heyman, Geoffrey Hutchinson, Hee Jin Kang, Michelle Kloehn, Yijun Liao, Minette Lee Managhas, Tiana Markova-Gold, Stephen Meierding, Maria Passarotti, Suzanne Révy, Jon Shireman, Emily Shur, Brea Souders, Tema Stauffer, Julianna Swaney, Jane Tam, Hidemi Takagi and Jennifer Williams.
Nina Buesing Corvallo of Nymphoto: Theory of Pink
Beyond the traditional professional collectives there are also more think tank inspired efforts such as Many which is “a collective project exhibiting fine photography found by fine photographers” and less structured endeavors such as ithoughtiwasalone which is described as “an online platform for photographers who, while being very different, are united by a common starting point: to capture what surrounds their lives without worrying about the whats, the hows, and the why.”
Jérémie Egry of ithoughtiwasalone: Les Oiseaux de Passage
If that doesn’t inspire you to find your collective niche or start your own collective, I don’t know what will! So get out there and pool your resources for the greater good!
