Daniel Garber, A Wooded Watershed, 1926 being installed at James A. Michener Art Museum
October 30, 2024
Amie Potsic interviews Bruce Katsiff about his experience building the art collection for the James A. Michener Art Museum as the Founding Director.
Bruce Katsiff is an accomplished photographer whose poignant and varied work encompasses environmental portraiture, collage, and carefully curated constructions of bones and decay. Seeing elegance beyond the surface, Katsiff’s work reveals complexity and empathy as well as a virtuosity with camera and darkroom. His Platinum Palladium and Gelatin Silver prints made with a 20” x 24” view camera are a testament to the manner in which his work combines science with the magical and unknowable beyond the lens.
Katsiff earned his BFA from the Rochester Institute of Technology and his MFA from Pratt Institute. His work has been exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art and is held in the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts Houston, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Katsiff has published two monographs on his work, with Nature Morte accompanying his solo exhibition at the Delaware Art Museum.
Born in Philadelphia where he attended Central High School, Bruce Katsiff went on to study photography at Rochester Institute of Technology and completed graduate work at Pratt Institute, earning BFA and MFA degrees. He also attended postgraduate studies at Oxford University. His work has been exhibited in museums and galleries including the Museum of Modern Art, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Art. For 25 years, he taught photography and from 1989 to 2012 served as Director/CEO of the James A. Michener Art Museum.
bruce katsiff: River Town Portraits
© Bruce Katsiff, Kenneth Bergram, artist and his wife, 1972, Gelatin Silver Print, 7 x 9 inches
© Bruce Katsiff, Val and Mai Sigstedt, 1972, Gelatin Silver Print, 8 x 10 inches
© Bruce Katsiff, Steve and Paula with friend, Gelatin Silver Print, 9 x 7 inches, 1972
© Bruce Katsiff, Bob and Lillian Russell, two Lithuanian souls, 1972, Gelatin Silver Print, 8 x 10 inches
To learn more about Bruce Katsiff visit, www.brucekatsiff.com.