Raїssa Venables (born 1977) is an American photographer.

Background and education

Venables was born in 1977 in

New Paltz, New York New Paltz () is an incorporated U.S. town in Ulster County, New York. The population was 14,407 at the 2020 census. The town is located in the southeastern part of the county and is south of Kingston. New Paltz contains a village, also with ...

. From 1993 to 1997, she attended the Arts Student’s League in

Manhattan Manhattan ( ) is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the Boroughs of New York City, five boroughs of New York City. Coextensive with New York County, Manhattan is the County statistics of the United States#Smallest, larg ...

, concentrating on Anatomy for Life Drawing. In 1999 she received a BFA degree in photography and ceramic sculpture from the

Kansas City Art Institute The Kansas City Art Institute (KCAI) is a private art school in Kansas City, Missouri. The college was founded in 1885 and is an accredited by the National Association of Schools of Art and Design and Higher Learning Commission. The institute ...

Kansas City, Missouri Kansas City, Missouri, abbreviated KC or KCMO, is the largest city in the U.S. state of Missouri by List of cities in Missouri, population and area. The city lies within Jackson County, Missouri, Jackson, Clay County, Missouri, Clay, and Pl ...

. She earned a master's degree in photography at the Milton Avery Graduate School of Arts at

Bard College Bard College is a private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York. The campus overlooks the Hudson River and Catskill Mountains within the Hudson River Historic District ...

Annandale-on-Hudson, New York Annandale-on-Hudson is a Hamlet (New York), hamlet in Dutchess County, New York, United States, located in the Hudson Valley town of Red Hook, New York, Red Hook, across the Hudson River from Kingston, New York, Kingston. The hamlet consists main ...

and a MFA degree in photography in 2002.

Philosophy and style

Venables' photographs are about planar relationship, passage of time, motion, and perceptual fields, blurring the realm of the real world with the imagined one. She is influenced by Early Renaissance Flemish painters including

Jan van Eyck Jan van Eyck ( ; ; – 9 July 1441) was a Flemish people, Flemish painter active in Bruges who was one of the early innovators of what became known as Early Netherlandish painting, and one of the most significant representatives of Early Nort ...

Rogier van der Weyden Rogier van der Weyden (; 1399 or 140018 June 1464), initially known as Roger de le Pasture (), was an Early Netherlandish painting, early Netherlandish painter whose surviving works consist mainly of religious triptychs, altarpieces, and commis ...

, and

Robert Campin Robert Campin (Valenciennes (France) c. 1375 - Tournai (Belgium) 26 April 1444) now usually identified with the Master of Flémalle (earlier the Master of the Merode Triptych, before the discovery of three other similar panels), was a master pai ...

particularly with their usage of color and lighting. Venables' work is also influenced by the neo-cubistic approach to splitting and dissolving an object or space before reassembling them together. Curators make the comparison of Venables’ work with thematic perspective found in

medieval art The medieval art of the Western world covers a vast scope of time and place, with over 1000 years of art in Europe, and at certain periods in Western Asia and Northern Africa. It includes major art movements and periods, national and regional ar ...

, in which objects are arranged in accordance to their spiritual values as opposed to their natural ones. Matthias Harder, director of the Helmut Newton Foundation in

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

, wrote about the artist’s reason for taking this approach, “Venables’ real intention is to open up unfamiliar perspectives and to transform real spaces into imaginary ones with realistic traits.”

Publications

Solo exhibition catalogues

* ''Raïssa Venables.'' Ostfildern-Ruit, Germany: Hatje Cantz, 2006, edited by with a foreword by Monika Machnicki, essays by Matthias Harder and Monika Machnicki and a transcript of an interview between Venables and Lori Waxman, touring exhibition catalogue * ''Raïssa Venables, BAT CampusGalerie Exhibition.'' Bayreuth, Germany: CampusGalerie of British American Tobacco, 2010 with an essay by Ulf Erdmann Ziegler, exhibition catalogue

Group exhibition catalogues

* Lange, Christiane, and Nils Ohlsen. ''Realismus: das Abenteuer der Wirklichkeit'' = Realism: the adventure of reality Munich: Hirmer, 2010. "Catalog of an exhibition held at the Kunsthalle Emden, January 23-May 24, 2010, and Kunsthalle der Hypo-Kulturstiftung, Munich, June 11-September 5, 2010" * ''Real: Photographs from the Collection of the DZ Bank.'' Germany: Hatje Cantz, 2010, edited by Luminita Sabau with contributions by Walter Grasskamp, Sabau, Martin Seel, et al.. German and English, exhibition catalogue

Solo exhibitions

* nknown name of exhibition , March–April 2006; Städtische Galerie Waldkraiburg February–March 2007; Kunstverein Ludwigshafen, May–July 2007; Kunstverein Grafschaft Bentheim, October–December 2007; , 2007/2008 *''Raissa Venables: Intimacies,'' Jersey City Museum, New Jersey *''Raissa Venables,'' Klaudia Marr Gallery, Santa Fe, NM

Collections

Venables' work is held in the following permanent public collections: *, Emden, Germany *

Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art is an art gallery, art museum in Kansas City, Missouri, Kansas City, Missouri, known for its encyclopedic collection of art from nearly every continent and culture, and especially for its extensive collection of A ...

, Kansas City, Missouri (Hall Family Foundation gift): 1 print, "Cupola" (2005) * Anderson Museum of Contemporary Art, New Mexico: 1 print, "Yellow Steps" (2007)

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Venables, Raissa 1977 births Living people Kansas City Art Institute alumni American women photographers 21st-century American women