The Poetics of Observation: Making Your Work More Expressive
In image-making today, the lines between art and documentary photography are often blurring and overlapping, opening up exciting visual possibilities for us as photographers. Whether you’re experienced with documentary storytelling and interested in making more personally expressive work, or a beginner wanting to make yourself more present in your photographs, in this class you’ll explore visual strategies for going beyond traditional modes of documentary image making.
We’ll focus on making lyrical photographs, supported by in-class presentations that will guide you through the flow of decision-making as you develop a project. We’ll also explore how each step is an opportunity for personal expression — from camera technique through editing, sequencing, content, context, and the material decisions of presenting your photos. Weekly assignments will be accompanied by suggested readings, and we’ll have time for regular critique.
Tom Griggs is a photographer, editor, educator, writer, and curator living between Colombia and Mexico since 2010. He has exhibited his photographs internationally including exhibitions in New York, Berlin, London, Arles, Madrid, and Belfast, and his work is in the collections of the Museum of Modern Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the National Gallery, Centro de la Imagen in Mexico City, Stanford University, Harvard University, and La Biblioteca Pública Piloto in Medellín, among others.
Tom holds a master’s degree in photography from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design. His last photobook, A Creature Obeys a Creature That Wants, was published by Mesa Estándar in 2023.
