Long Term Program

The Photobook

About the Program

 

Whether you have an idea for a project that is intended for the book form or are already working on one, this intensive and comprehensive program is designed to guide you through every step of the process of making a photobook. The objective is to have a physical maquette or artist book ready to present to publishers or to self-publish upon completion of the course, as well as to establish a practice and community to support them going forward.

The program combines online seminars, critiques with guest artists, and one-on-one sessions, as well as optional in-person and online workshops. Working with several instructors throughout the program, while also receiving assignments and feedback from guest critics, participants will have both continuity and variety of support. The learning process will be based on regular production of physical maquettes, which will lead participants to deepen their understanding of the book form and allow them to continue redefining it for themselves. Reading and writing assignments, as well as individualized exercises throughout the year will develop the skills and knowledge necessary for a photobook maker.

 

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This program has been developed in collaboration with the Image Threads Collective.

“…anyone looking to move their body of work forward could not find a more useful and productive environment.”

— Paul d’Orleans

" ... we have been able to establish a real sense of community and caring [in the course] which has been wonderful."

— Ruth Lauer Manenti

“…The course is extraordinary! Beyond being a sophisticated exploration of the form, the course has, quite literally, re-energized and refined my entire artistic practice."  

— Deborah Kuschner

  • Jenia Fridlyand

    Jenia Fridlyand (Moscow, 1975) is a photographer and educator based in New York City and the Hudson Valley. Her photographs and books have been exhibited in the United States and abroad. Fridlyand’s artist’s book Entrance to Our Valley was shortlisted for the Paris Photo - Aperture First Photobook Award, and trade editions were published by TIS Books. Her subsequent body of work will be the subject of a solo exhibition at Fototeca de Cuba in Havana in November 2023. She is represented by Galerie Wouter van Leeuwen, Amsterdam.

    Fridlyand is a co-founder of Image Threads Collective and has been teaching photobook courses at Penumbra since 2018. She studied photography at Centre Iris and Université Paris VIII, and holds an MFA from the University of Hartford’s International Limited-Residency program.

  • Tim Carpenter

    Tim Carpenter is a photographer, writer, and educator who works in Brooklyn and central Illinois. He is the author of several photobooks, among them A month of Sundays (TIS books); Christmas Day, Bucks Pond Road (The Ice Plant); Local objects (The Ice Plant); township (TIS/dumbsaint); Bement grain (TIS/dumbsaint); Still feel gone (Deadbeat Club Press); The king of the birds (TIS books); and A house and a tree (TIS books). Tim received an MFA in Photography from the Hartford Art School in 2012. His book-length essay To photograph is to learn how to die was published by The Ice Plant in Fall 2022.

    Kevin Kunstadt

    Kevin Kunstadt (b. 1982, New York, NY) lives and works in Brooklyn, NY. He received his BA in Visual Art from Brown University in 2004, and his MFA in photography from Hartford Art School’s international limited residency program in 2017.

    Since 2010 Kunstadt has produced several photographic projects in book form, on subjects as varied as: asphalt road resurfacing, gunpowder, scrap metal, and “sneakers, bricks, and politics.” These have been nominated for the Mack First Book Award, and shortlisted for the Kassel, Luma Rencontres, Fiebre, and La Fabrica Dummy Awards.

    His book All for the Best was published by Penumbra in 2020 and he currently manages Penumbra’s Risograph Print and Publication Residency Program.

    Adam Meeks

    Adam Meeks is a Brooklyn-based filmmaker and graduate of NYU's Tisch School of the Arts. His films have screened at the Maryland Film Festival, Seattle International Film Festival, DC Shorts, and numerous other festivals nationwide. His work frequently examines rural and marginalized communities, and aims to exist within the intersection of documentary and narrative processes. He currently works as a video producer at Jazz at Lincoln Center, and is a 2019 Jacob Burns Emerging Artist Fellow.

    Sara J. Winston

    Sara J. Winston is an artist based in the Hudson Valley region of New York, USA. She works with photographs, text, and the book form to describe and respond to chronic illness and its ongoing impact on her body, mind, family, and memory. Sara is the author of several photobooks, among them Shades (collaboration with Aaron Canipe & Nat Ward; Push Pull Editions, 2023), A Lick and a Promise (Candor Arts, 2017) and Homesick (Zatara Press, 2015). Sara is the Photography Program Coordinator at Bard College; a contributor to Lenscratch; and a member of Storm King Art Center‘s Accessibility Advisory Group.

    On June 29, 2023, her long-term project about multiple sclerosis care, Our body is a clock, was adapted and published as an op-ed in the New York Times, titled ‘My body is a clock’: The Private Life of Chronic Care.

  • Evan Davis

    Evan Davis is a photographer and photobook maker based in Los Angeles. He holds a bachelor's degree from UC Davis in Technocultural Studies.

    While living in the Bay Area, he founded a photo collective and publishing identity called Group Study, and was involved with a youth mentorship program First Exposures.

    In 2020, he was a student in the inaugural class of the Image Threads/Penumbra Foundation’s Long Term Photobook Program, and has been the program's teaching assistant and coordinator since 2021. 

    His self-published book, It Was Absolutely Worth It, debuted at Zona Maco in Mexico City in 2022.

Previous & Current Guest Artists & Critics

 
Israel Ariño [Ediciones Anómalas]
israelarino.com
edicionesanomalas.com/en
Barbara Bosworth
Barbara Bosworth is a photographer whose large-format images explore both overt and subtle relationships between humans and the rest of the natural world. Whether chronicling the efforts of hunters or bird banders or evoking the seasonal changes that transform mountains and meadows, Bosworth’s caring attention to the world around her results in images that similarly inspire viewers to look closely.

Bosworth grew up in Novelty, Ohio. She currently lives in Massachusetts, where she is a professor emeritus of photography at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design in Boston. Over her long career, Bosworth has photographed in both black and white and color. Her single images display a generous attention to small facts, while her large-scale triptychs reveal a panoramic awareness, one that lets viewers glimpse relationships between frames across a wide field. While all of Bosworth’s projects remind viewers not only that we shape the rest of nature but that it also shapes us.

Bosworth’s work has been widely exhibited, notably in recent retrospectives at the Denver Art Museum in Colorado, Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts, the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, D.C., and the Phoenix Art Museum in Arizona. Her publications include, The Sea (Radius Books, 2022), The Heavens (Radius Books, 2018), The Meadow (Radius Books, 2015), Natural Histories (Radius Books, 2013), Trees: National Champions (MIT Press; Center for Creative Photography, University of Arizona, 2005).

https://www.barbarabosworth.com/
Morgan Crowncroft-Brown [MACK]
Morgan is the designer and production manager at London-based book publisher MACK. She has had the opportunity to work with many artists including Stephen Shore, Justine Kurland, Raymond Meeks, Alec Soth, Moyra Davey, Teju Cole, and Gregory Halpern. Morgan is also a part of the editorial board at MACK.
morgan-cb.com
mackbooks.co.uk
Nelson Chan [TIS Books]
Nelson Chan was born in New Jersey to immigrant parents from Hong Kong and Taiwan and has spent most of his life between the States and Hong Kong. Having grown up on two continents with unique cultures, this immigrant experience has influenced the majority of his work.

Nelson is a graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design, where he received his BFA and a graduate of the University of Hartford, Hartford Art School, where he received his MFA. He has been exhibited nationally and internationally at institutions such as the Museum of Chinese in America, New York, NY; Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA; The Print Center, Philadelphia, PA; Kunstlerhaus Bethanien, Berlin, Germany; and 798 Space, Beijing, China. His books are collected in the institutional libraries of the Harry Ransom Center, The MET, The Whitney, and MoMA.

Book publishing is a primary focus of Nelson’s studio practice. He is a co-founder of TIS books, where they have published titles by Justine Kurland, John Gossage and Raymond Meeks. From 2016-19 he was the Production Manager of Aperture Foundation, where he made monographs with artists such as Deana Lawson, Hank Willis Thomas, Stephen Shore and Sally Mann, among others. Nelson is based in the Bay Area where he is an Assistant Professor of Photography at the California College of the Arts.

nelsonchanphotography.com
tisbooks.pub
Odette England

Odette England was raised in an isolated immigrant farming community in Australia and is based in Providence, RI. She is a 2022-23 Guggenheim Fellow and a 2023 Foam Paul Huf Award Nominee. Other awards include a Rhode Island Council 2022 Artist Fellowship and grants from the Robert Rauschenberg Foundation and Puffin Foundation. Her third photobook, Dairy Character, won the 2021 Light Work Book Award. Her photographs have been exhibited worldwide in over 100 museums and galleries. She received her MFA from the Rhode Island School of Design and is a visiting professor at Brown University and Amherst College.

odetteengland.com
John Gossage
John Gossage
Hans Gremmen [FW:Books]
hansgremmen.nl
FW:Books
Tine Gunz
Tine Guns (b. 1983) lives and works in Ghent, Belgium. She is working on her PhD, entitled The Photobook as a Visual Page-Turner: A pre- and post-cinema­tographic montage story (LUCA), and participates in Bioscopic Books: Artist’s books as seen through the cinema eye (LUCA). She has exhibited in Cinematek/BOZAR Brussels, Netwerk Aalst and Casino Luxembourg. Her films were screened at festivals like Jean Rouch Festival in Paris and biennials like Ostrale in Dresden. Her photos were selected for Voies Off in Arles, Antwerp Photo and Salut d’honneur Jan Hoet. In 2015 she was selected for .tiff Young Artists Belgium after a nomination by FOMU Antwerp, while her artist’s book The Diver was shortlisted for the MACK First Book Award. She was awarded the 2017 Biennial Prize for Visual Arts by the Province of East-Flanders.
tineguns.com
Curran Hatleberg
curranhatleberg.com
Alan Huck
Alan Huck is a photographer & writer currently living in North Carolina. He received his MFA from the University of Hartford in 2018.
alanhuck.com
João Linneu [Void]
Brazilian-born, based in Reykjavík, João Linneu (1978) graduated in Communication and worked for 22 years as Art Director, Head of Art and Creative Director in several advertising agencies in São Paulo and London. He received prestigious design and advertising awards such as the D&AD, Cannes Lions, One Show and Clio. For the last 15 years, João was also started developing his photographic projects, which lead him to co-found Void, an organization focused on publishing photography books and book-making education. Void works with both established and up-and-coming artists, proudly fostering photographers' debut books.
joaolinneu.com
void.photo
Raymond Meeks
raymondmeeks.com
Sabrina Mandanici

Sabrina Mandanici is German-Italian art critic and writer. She holds an MA in Art History and Comparative Literature from the Johannes Gutenberg-University Mainz and an MFA in Art Criticism and Writing from the School of Visual Arts. Currently, she is a PhD candidate in Creative Writing at Bath Spa University, researching art criticism as a form of storytelling.

Sabrina was a Research Fellow of the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD), a Fulbright fellow, and a Museum Curators for Photography fellow of the Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach-Foundation. She has worked at the Sprengel Museum Hannover, the Museum Folkwang Essen, and the Walther Collection, among other institutions. In 2021 she curated the group exhibition “What’s your name when you’re at home” at Penumbra Foundation (NYC). Her writing has appeared in Artfrorum.com, Aperture, The Brooklyn Rail, Collector Daily, Camera Austria, and elsewhere. Other publications include catalogue essays on UMBO, Garry Winogrand, and Katharina Gaenssler; and an essay for Alys Tomlinson’s forthcoming photobook “Gli Isolani/The Islanders” (GOST Books).

Emma Phillips
Emma Phillips (Mornington, 1989) is a photographer and writer based in Melbourne, Australia. Her photographs have been exhibited widely and published in a variety of contexts. Most recently her exhibition "Too Much to Dream" turned its gaze toward a more speculative mode of image making, using the gap between text and image to pose questions on and about the nature of representational discourses. From 2014-2019 Emma was the photobook buyer at Perimeter Books, where she also implemented the Perimeter Talks program, a series of panel discussions, lectures, and more casual in-conversations with publishers, artists, curators, designers, writers and editors exploring and addressing various themes and issues relating to contemporary photographic, art and design publishing. Emma is a writer on photography and photographic practises, contributing to journals such as The Heavy Collective. She graduated in 2017 with an MFA from the University of Hartford’s International Limited-Residency program. Emma is represented by ReadingRoom, Melbourne.
emmaphillips.net
Igor Posner [Red Hook Editions]
Born in Leningrad (St. Petersburg). After the fall of the Soviet Union, Igor moved to California in the early 90s. He studied molecular and cell biology at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he first started to take pictures and experiment in the darkroom. Initial infatuation with picture-taking led Igor to explore the silent and haunting experience of walking after dark on the streets of Los Angeles and Tijuana. Collision of social and typical with personal and psychological, this first series of images “No Such Records” savors the strange solitude of the enigmatic region between California and Mexico; amid the streets, bars, night shelter hotels, and disappearing night figures. After 14 years, Igor returned to St. Petersburg in 2006, taking up photography full time, which led to a book project entitled“Past Perfect Continuous”, published by Red Hook Editions in 2017. In 2022, Igor published his second monograph, entitled, “Cargó.” The book is a visual exploration of psychological aspects of migration and gradual disappearance of neighborhoods based on immigrant communities in North America. At present, Igor is based in New York. In 2021, he joined Red Hook Editions, Brooklyn based independent publishing company, as a managing partner. Igor’s work has been shown in North America, Europe, Russia, and Southeast Asia. He joined Prospekt Photographers agency as a full member in 2011.
igorposner.net
redhookeditions.com
Grégoire Pujade-Lauraine
Grégoire Pujade-Lauraine is a French photographer and book designer. After leading the design and production of the books at MACK during 5 years, he’s been working independently for publishers in the art and photography sector, contributing to award-winning books by artists such as Alec Soth, Joan Fontcuberta, Adam Broomberg & Oliver Chanarin, Pieter Hugo, Guido Guidi, Paul Graham, David Campany, Albarrán Cabrera among others, and collaborating with institutions ranging from the Tate to Le Bal, the Hasselblad Foundation to the Victoria and Albert Museum, the Jeu de Paume to the Centre National des Arts Plastiques. The third book of his own artistic work, Double Orbit, was published in the Spring of 2021, following The Significant Savages (RVB, 2011) and A Perpetual Season (MACK, 2014)
gregoirepujadelauraine.com
Jo Ractliffe
Since the 1980s, Jo Ractliffe’s photographs have reflected her ongoing preoccupation with the South African landscape and the ways in which it figures in the country’s imaginary, particularly the violent legacies of apartheid.The survey exhibition Jo Ractliffe: Drives took place at the Art Institute of Chicago (2020 – 21). Other solo exhibitions include Being There, Stevenson, Cape Town (2021); Signs of Life, Stevenson, Cape Town (2019); Hay Tiempo, No Hay Tiempo, Centro Fotográfico Álvarez Bravo, Oaxaca (2018); Everything is Everything, Stevenson, Johannesburg (2017); The Aftermath of Conflict: Jo Ractliffe's Photographs of Angola and South Africa, the Metropolitan Museum of Modern Art, New York (2015) and Someone Else's Country at the Peabody Essex Museum, Massachusetts, (2014). Her photo-books include Being There (2022); Jo Ractliffe: Photographs 1980s to Now (2020); Signs of Life (2019); Everything is Everything (2017); The Borderlands (2015), As Terras do Fim do Mundo (2010) and Terreno Ocupado (2008).

Jo Ractliffe

Irina Rozovsky
Irina Rozovsky (born in Moscow, raised in the US), photographs people and places, transforming external landscapes into interior states. She has published two monographs (One to Nothing 2011 and Island in my Mind 2015). Her third book, In Plain Air, is forthcoming with TBW Books. Her work is in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and has appeared in The New Yorker, New York Times Magazine, Harpers, and Vice. Irina lives and works in Athens, Georgia where she and her husband Mark Steinmetz run the photography project space The Humid. Irina is represented by Claxton Projects.
irinar.com
Mariela Sancari
marielasancari.com
Mike Slack [The Ice Plant]
Mike Slack lives and works in Los Angeles, CA. A co-founder of The Ice Plant, his books include The Transverse Path, the Polaroid trilogy OK OK OK, Scorpio, and Pyramids, as well as High Tide and Shrubs of Death. His work has appeared in Harper’s, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and his photographs are in the permanent collection of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
mike-slack.com
theiceplant.cc
Terri Weifenbach
Terri Weifenbach is a photographer interested primarily, but not exclusively, in the book form. Since her first book, In Your Dreams, was published in 1997 she has authored more than eighteen titles. She has worked with several publishers, most recently Atelier EXB in Paris where she now resides. Weifenbach taught the basics of photography, analog color photography as well as courses and seminars on the photobook at the Corcoran College of Art and Design, American University and Georgetown University where she lived previously in Washington, DC. In 2015 she was awarded the Guggenheim Fellowship. She exhibits internationally and had her first solo museum exhibition, The May Sun, at the IZU Photo Museum in Japan in 2017.
terriweifenbach.com
Carl Wooley [TIS Books]
Carl Wooley is a photographer and co-founder of TIS books, a Brooklyn-based publisher of photobooks. Recent publications include Entrance to Our Valley, by Jenia Fridlyand, El Libro Supremo de la Suerte, by Rose Marie Cromwell; township, by Raymond Meeks, Tim Carpenter, Adrianna Ault, and Brad Zellar; and A Dozen Failures, by John Gossage. Carl is a graduate of the University of Hartford, Hartford Art School, where he received his MFA.
carlwooley.com
tisbooks.pub
Brad Zellar
Brad Zellar is a writer and editor who has collaborated with photographer Alec Soth on a number of projects, including The LBM Dispatch, a series of seven newspapers that explored the status of American community in the age of cyberspace. Zellar has also made books with Adrianna Ault, Raymond Meeks, Tim Carpenter, and Jason Vaughn, and is the author of Suburban World: The Norling Photos, Conductors of the Moving World, House of Coates, and Driftless. His most recent book is Till the Wheels Fall Off, a novel. He lives in St. Paul.
Brad Zellar

Information Session and Q&A

 

Live Q&A session - Sunday Sept 17 2023 12pm EST

Register Here!

Program Chair Jenia Fridlyand and Program Coordinator Evan Davis will be available via Zoom to discuss the 2024 program in further detail and to answer any additional questions you may have.

These info sessions are free and open to the public.

Tuition & Scholarships

 

Tuition: the tuition for the 2024 program ranges from $7,550 to $9,396 depending upon a chosen payment schedule:

  • $7,550: Paid early (1×).

  • $8,124: $4062.00 paid every 6 months (2×).

  • $8,712: $1452.00 paid every 2 months (6×).

  • $9,396: $783.00 paid every month (12×).

Registration: there is a one-time registration fee of $75. This fee includes a complimentary one year individual membership at Penumbra Foundation. This fee is waived for all current members.


Payment: credit cards, PayPal, checks and electronic checks are accepted. For more information on tuition and payment please contact: ltp@penumbrafoundation.org

Need-based Scholarships: 1 – 2 scholarship spots exist each year – depending upon the general level of enrollment. To apply for a scholarship spot, indicate your desire to do so on the application form. In addition to providing a written statement regarding need-based circumstances, you will also be required to submit household income information.


How to Apply

 

Application for the 2024 program requires:

  • A short bio.

  • A project statement.

  • A description of what you would like to get out of the program.

  • Up to 20 images of your current work.

  • A brief online interview (to be scheduled at a later date).

The deadline to apply for the 2024 program is October 6th, 2023. It is free to apply.


Timeline

 

8/21/23: Applications Open & Rolling Admissions Begin
8/28/23 – 10/20/23: Virtual Interviews Conducted via Zoom
10/06/23: Applications Close
10/31/23: Final Decisions Sent
11/15/23: Contracts & Registration Fees Due
1/13/24: Program Starts
12/20/24: Program Concludes

*all dates subject to change


F.A.Q.

How much of the program will take place online vs. in-person? Is an in-person component required?
The program is structured to deliver the full learning experience online. However, for those participants who live in – or are able to travel to – New York City, Penumbra Foundation will be offering discounts on several optional in-person workshops and classes that will both support and augment the online curriculum.
What software, hardware, photography equipment, and other materials will I need to have to take the course?
All participants will need to have sufficient internet connectivity to participate in group and individual sessions online via zoom; cloud storage to keep and share their assignments, and a basic camera to make videos of their book dummies. It is up to each participant to decide what equipment they use to photograph and what materials/methods they use to make their book dummies with.
Who is the program intended for?
Anyone who is working with photography and who is interested in making photobooks.
What skills should I already have?
There are no prerequisite skills for this program. The instructors will guide students through the process of acquiring any skills/techniques necessary to complete the assignments and to achieve the goal of making a book maquette.
If I have already published or self-published a photobook am I overqualified for this program?
The program is structured to challenge any photobook maker regardless of their level of expertise or prior experience. The assignments are designed to be open-ended and to elevate their skills and to push their understanding of what a photobook can be.
How much time will be spent in class?
Throughout the year, the program schedule includes 10+ one-on-one sessions with advisors, and 20+ group sessions which include presentations by guest artists, reading/writing seminars, and group critiques, led by advisors and guest critics. The one-on-one sessions are 45 minutes each and are scheduled according to each participant’s and advisor’s individual schedules. The group sessions are 2-5 hours each, and are held on weekends to accommodate different time zones and the varied work/life schedules of the participants.
How much time should I plan to spend working outside of class time?
This program is best suited for the self-motivated. While the assignments and readings will keep you busy, the bulk of the work will be in developing your book project – photographing, editing/sequencing, writing for and/or about your work, and, of course, making maquettes. While that process will be amply supported by one-on-one and group instruction, it will be up to each student to challenge themselves to the full extent of their abilities.
How will students be evaluated?
Students will receive feedback on their assignments and personal work from instructors and their peers during group and one-on-one sessions
What is the class size?
The class size will be limited to 12 participants.
Do I need to be a fluent English speaker to take this program?
Lectures, discussions, and critiques will be conducted in English, and all of the reading and writing will be assigned in English as well. If you feel you can comfortably follow a conversation and get your thoughts across in English, then you will be able to fully participate in the program.
What is the refund policy?
In the event that a student must cancel their registration, they may do so any time before and up to 15 days prior to the start of the program, and will receive an 80% refund of the program cost plus any material fees.
In the event a student must cancel attendance after the start of the program, this will be considered a withdrawal. The program costs are not refundable but a 20% discount will be given toward another class/es.
Please provide as much advance notice as possible for consideration. Beyond this, Penumbra Foundation cannot be held responsible for any cancellations outside of Penumbra Foundation’s control.
Is there any way to receive a discount on the course?
The payment plan for the 2024 program, offers considerable discounts for early payment (see Tuition, above). Additionally, the $75 registration fee will be waived for those who are already members at Penumbra Foundation.
Is financial aid available?
No, but scholarships may be available, depending upon enrollment (see Tuition, above).