March 2015 Artist in Residency: Nicole white

Nicole White, Ruined Cliché Verre 3 from Light Studies

Welcome to our newest artist in residence, Nicole White! Nicole joins us from the Bluegrass State, where she works as a faculty member in the School of Art & Visual Studies at the University of Kentucky. Prior to that Nicole served as the Assistant Director of Schneider Gallery here in Chicago for two years, and as co-operator of the now defunct art space 3433. 

While with us Nicole will be producing work for the exhibitions Immediate Experience at the Contemporary Art Center of Peoria (May-June of 2015) and Capturing Light: The Photography of Nicole White and Gary Mesa-Gaido at the Living Arts and Science Center in Lexington, Kentucky. In her own words:

"I am creating a series of analog color photograms (via darkroom and scanning bed) using varied forms of glass to distort the projection of light. In some instances, the glass will be scanned and enlarged to produce a much larger iteration of the original, while in others, the unique analog photogram will be shown....

This work is part of an evolution of pieces I have been working on that examines the photographic process via an emphasis on light and how – depending on its use – light can produce a detailed rendering or a minimal suggestion of the item placed in front of it. I am hoping that this work can speak more directly to the latter; while my images are very legible it is challenging to determine what the source of the image is. They are aesthetically engaging in both a formal and conceptual manner and they speak to the current photographic interest in “proto-photographic processes” while pointing back to conceptual and structuralist theory."

Nicole is a brainiac, with three different degrees to her name: an MFA in Studio from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, an MA in Art History from the University of Connecticut, and a BFA from the Massachusetts College of Art + Design. She's printed with LATITUDE before, and back in October of 2013 she presented a lecture on Heidegger in our space, entitled "The Thing and It's Stuff." We're glad to have Nicole back in Chicago, albeit briefly!