Lorie Novak

Website:
http://cvisions.cat.nyu.edu/novak/index.html

Galleries/Shows/Exhibitions:
ArtSway, Hampshire, England; The International Center for Photography, NY; Center for Creative Photography, Tucson, AZ; The Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago; the Houston Center for Photography; Breda Fotografica, the Netherlands; Jayne Baum Gallery, NY; University Art Museum, Cal. State Univ. Long Beach; Addison Gallery, Andover, MA; Stanford University Art Museum. Her work has been in group exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art, NY; The Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.; National Museum of American Art, Washington, DC.; Art Institute of Chicago; and The Southeast Museum of Photography, Daytona Beach, FL.



I was very surprised to find Lorie Novak's work. Her work has a lot of similarities with mine. Even some of her installations were similar to certain ideas I had about installing my work for a final exhibition. She works with old family photographs by incorporating them into new photographs. She seems to do this my combining the old picture with an original of hers or she places the old photograph into a certain environment, her personal space. In some of her pictures there may be a glare on the old photograph. You can see a window, trees, or someones face in the glare. This brings the past (the old family photograph) into the present.
This is something I have been thinking about while working with family films and the television. I was toying with the idea of bringing myself into the old film stills by using the glare from light on the screen. I may feel that this is too readily understood, too obvious for what I am trying to do. Looking at Novak's work made think about this possibility again. Seeing the glare in her images make me take a closer, longer look at the picture. It doesn't seem quite as obvious as I would have imagined. I find myself looking for a figure or some sort of image in the glare. Rather than making the work too obvious, it makes it a bit more mysterious.
I am very pleased with finding this photographer. It is interesting to see someones present day work that so closely resembles mine.