Since 2010, the FotoFocus Biennial, the largest photography biennial in America, has activated various venues across Greater Cincinnati, Dayton, Columbus and Northern Kentucky with a program focused on fine art photography and other lens-based art. This year’s extensive edition features 107 projects at eighty-six participating venues, all organized under the vision of artistic director and curator Kevin Moore. Ahead of the September 26 opening, Observer spoke with Moore to learn more about this year’s edition, its central theme and the organization’s vision.
FotoFocus 2024 is titled “backstories,” a concept deeply embedded in photography. As Moore put it, a photograph depicts a moment in time that is just one part of a larger story. “You don’t know what happened before the photograph was taken, you don’t know what happens after,” he said. “And then there are all kinds of other backstories behind each shoot.” Photographs represent just one perspective, a snapshot of reality that excludes countless other points of view and versions of events. The theme feels especially relevant today, as propaganda circulates through images that are endlessly manipulated and remediated, and the exhibitions in this year’s Biennial will explore that idea, uncovering untold stories, filling in gaps and reclaiming narratives in close connection to the historical, cultural and political contexts in which they were created.
Among the highlights of this year’s Biennial, Cincinnati’s Contemporary Arts Center will feature a show by German photographer Barbara Probst, whose work explores the inherent subjectivity of every shoot. Since 2000, Probst has taken multiple images of actors in a single scene, captured simultaneously with several cameras via a radio-controlled system. The resulting series presents a complex and playful cinematic vision of how people act fluidly in time and space, revealing nuances that often elude a single photograph. By challenging the limits of photography in capturing reality, Probst raises the question of where visual truth lies when multiple perspectives are at play. Does more visual data lead to greater realism or less? Titled “Subjective Evidence,” the exhibition is also the first American survey of Probst’s 25-year career.
Another intriguing exhibition is the survey of American photographer, public artist, activist and physician Chip Thomas, also presented at Cincinnati’s Contemporary Arts Center. In the late 1980s, Thomas moved to the Navajo Nation, between Monument Valley and the Grand Canyon, to work as a physician while beginning to document the Navajo people (Diné). Combining public art, installation, film, and graphic media, his work offers a witty portrayal of local life alongside a critique of the effects of American capitalism on the landscape and people of his adopted community. The Cincinnati show focuses on his Painted Desert Project, a residency program in which he invites street artists from around the world to create work in the desert landscape, which he then documents through photography.
The Cincinnati Art Museum is presenting a survey on the early work of pioneering American photographer Ansel Adams. Featuring approximately eighty photographs, the show offers unprecedented insight into Adams’s journey from a 14-year-old tourist with a camera to one of the most influential photographers in American history. The exhibition also delves into his process and persona, showcasing unique archival objects such as Adams’s handwritten correspondence, snapshots, personal belongings and photographic working materials.
Also worth checking out are the three exhibitions dedicated to the photographic practice of Ming Smith, held at the Columbus Museum of Art and Wexner Center for the Arts. These shows provide a rare opportunity to immerse in Smith’s identity as an artist deeply connected to the diverse social and cultural fabric of Columbus. Notably, “Transcendence” at the Columbus Museum of Art presents the complete series for the first time. In this work, Smith moves beyond the physical referents of traditional photography, capturing society in a more intimate and emotional way while exploring the intersections of present, past, and future as she reconciles with her hometown.
Meanwhile, the Carnegie in Covington, KY, is hosting a thoughtfully curated show, “Southern Democratic,” which feels particularly timely given the current political climate and the upcoming elections. The exhibition centers on William Eggleston’s Election Eve series, created when the renowned American photographer was asked to document Jimmy Carter’s birthplace just weeks before the 1976 election. The series offers a sharp observation of evolving society in the South. Other artists in the show similarly present deep reflections on the shifting societal dynamics and traditions of the region. Featured artists include Louis Zoeller Bickett, John Hee Taek Chae, Tag Christof, Rose Marie Cromwell, Dawn DeDeaux, Claudia Keep, Coulter Fussell, Y. Malik Jalal, Casey Joiner, Albert Moser, Amy Pleasant and Polo Silk.
Artist Michael Coppage’s latest exhibition, “Humphrey Gets His Flowers,” moves between archival video, large-scale projection, mixed media collages, and photography to revisit Humphrey Humpkick, a character Coppage designed nearly twenty years ago to address the appropriation of African American culture, the demonization of Black men and what he calls the “systematic” destabilization of Black people.
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The entire FotoFocus Biennial program is vast, both in scope and in geography. In their efforts to build a democratic platform, the organizers launched the largest biennial in the country in terms of the number of artists and participants. That created logistical problems that were solved, Moore said, by engaging with all of the major exhibition spaces and arts organizations in Cincinnati and beyond. “Whether they specialize in photography or not, we’ve encouraged them to think about participating by having a photography exhibition in October during a biennial year,” he said. “With more than 100 venues, not many people ever see all of the exhibitions, but the theme creates a sense of unity.”
From our conversation, it’s clear that the aim of FotoFocus is to create a Biennial that reaches and engages a broad audience, especially in a region without the artistic saturation of cities like New York or Chicago. “Not to disparage my medium, but I think photography is an entry-level medium for many people,” Moore said. “It’s fairly easy to approach. It doesn’t intimidate people so much but is also ubiquitous.” While Cincinnati and the Northern Kentucky area may be lesser-known cultural hubs, they’ve developed a vibrant art scene in recent years, and events like FotoFocus can help fuel that growth. In fact, the art scenes here have been around for quite a while, according to him, and what many people don’t know is that FotoFocus also has an extensive public program that continues to impact the area throughout the year, beyond the Biennial.
“I think that, especially since Covid, there’s also more discussion about the decentralization of culture,” he said. “It’s almost Darwinian in that even though we have access to what’s going on everywhere, distinct cultures do develop in isolated places. Cincinnati has, for example, an incredible food scene, and it’s a part of the local culture. There’s also an art scene there.”
Reflecting on FotoFocus’ origins, Moore hypothesized that Tom Schiff, the patron who funded FotoFocus and is a photographer himself, simply wanted to see more photography exhibitions in Cincinnati. At that point, the only photography curator in town was working at the Cincinnati Art Museum and, as Moore tells it, had plans to leave. “Due to the fear that there wouldn’t be much photography representation in Cincinnati, he decided to fund this festival, which became more like a biennial and a symposium, a place of conversation and education around the medium.”
It’s very much a community event, albeit one with a very high-level educational mission. “I would say we’ve been very ambitious with who we’ve brought to speak, with guests like Catherine Opie, Germano Celant and various museum curators,” Moore said. This year, FotoFocus will welcome Kathy Ryan, longtime director of photography at the New York Times Magazine and a pioneer in blending fine art photography with photojournalism, as the keynote speaker for the Biennial Symposium during the opening weekend.
The buzz around the upcoming edition of FotoFocus may have something to do with the organization’s announcement of a forthcoming permanent space designed by José Garcia+Construction. The new FotoFocus Center, set to be completed by spring 2025, will expand the Biennial’s mission with year-round lens-based art programming. Located in Cincinnati, the two-story, 14,700-square-foot building will host exhibitions, screenings, events and educational programs.
Discussing the future of the FotoFocus Biennial and its role in the history of the medium, Moore envisions the next edition of the event—set to coincide with the country’s 250th anniversary—as focusing on the relationship between photography and recent U.S. history. Although photography as a medium originated in France, it has played a pivotal role in documenting the history, visual identity and narrative of an evolving United States. Next edition’s symposium will explore, among other themes, the intersections between photography and social economics.
The 2024 FotoFocus Biennial, “backstories,” opens on September 26.