May 25, 6:30-8:30pm, online
(Mallard Duck), 2018
Featuring Shelby Meyerhoff with Julie Mihaly, and Jürgen Lobert
Early photographers earned reputations for creating documents of truth, however photographers have also long played with those assumption. The practice of fabricating or constructing the subject of a photograph challenges the relationship between photography and the truth while allowing for the building of new narratives. Staged images change the approach to image making in direct opposition to the methods of candid and documentary genres, the constructed image depends on artifice and invention to create or manipulate the subject.
Shelby Meyerhoff is the featured photographer for PRC Nights Online: The Staged Photograph. In her Zoomorphics series, Meyerhoff transforms herself into creatures inspired by the natural world. Her process incorporates painting, performance, and photography. The resulting images challenge traditional dichotomies, including male/female and human/animal. Meyerhoff is a multidisciplinary artist based in the Boston area. She had her first solo show, Zoomorphics, at the Griffin Museum of Photography (MA) in 2020. Her work has been exhibited at venues across the country, including the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport (GA), the Attleboro Arts Museum (MA), the Mattatuck Museum (CT), and the LH Horton Jr. Gallery at San Joaquin Delta College (CA). Upcoming shows include a solo show at the Concord Free Public Library (MA) and a two-person show at the Hopkins Center for the Arts (MN). Zoomorphics has been featured in Harvard Magazine, Fraction Magazine, A Photo Editor, and UU World.
Julie Mihaly attended Vassar College before earning a BFA and MFA in photography from the San Francisco Art Institute. After teaching photography at NYC’s School of Visual Arts, and Mason Gross School of Art at Rutgers University, Mihaly contributed her talents as a photo director, editor and researcher to magazines such as Vanity Fair, Entertainment Weekly and Garden Design. She also wrote for Martha Stewart Living, Budget Living and Organic Style before returning to the full-time pursuit of her own photography. Mihaly has had a number of solo exhibitions and her work has been included in numerous invitational and juried exhibits. Eight books of Julie Mihaly’s photographs have been published. She currently lives & works in New York’s Hudson River Valley.
Her series, When We Weren’t Watching, is all about narrative, action & questions. What in the Sam Hill have these characters/items been up to while we’ve been distracted by daily life or REM sleep or the gazillion things that demand our attention every day. The pix images are little secret peeks into scenarios that we just haven’t taken the time to see. They may or may not exist in “real life,” but almost they do their best to imply or depict some sort of action.
Jürgen Lobert is a Massachusetts-based fine art photographer and educator, born and raised in Germany. He received a Ph.D. in atmospheric
chemistry from Gutenberg University in Mainz before moving to the US in 1991. Jürgen is fortunate to have a daytime job, so he was forced to specialize mostly in night photography. However, he also creates daytime long exposure, urban exploration and infrared imagery. In February 2022, Jürgen had a solo exhibit, Infralucent Clouds, at the Griffin
Museum of Photography @WinCam. Jürgen’s work has appeared in numerous group shows and he has organized, curated and exhibited shows in Massachusetts. Among those shows were the Night Becomes Us exhibit at the Art Complex Museum. His artwork is in the permanent collection of the Art Complex Museum, Duxbury MA and private collectors. Jürgen is a Master Member of the New England Camera Club Council (MNEC), an executive member of the Boston Camera Club and the founder and organizer of the Greater Boston Night Photographers Meetup group.