Exposure 2026

What Makes It Great? / Featured / August 18, 2026

By Suzanne Révy

Carpe Diem! I am enamored of photography’s ability to embrace the times. This year’s “Exposure 2026” exhibition sponsored by the Photographic Resource Center and installed in Vandernoot Gallery at Lesley University in Cambridge, MA is filled with the fleeting moments of life, including childhood, marriage and death. Juried by Audrey Lee Sands, The Richard L. Menschel Associate Curator of Photography at the Harvard Art Museums, the show features twelve photographers working with both documentary and constructed imagery in black and white and color. There will be a reception with the artists on August 26th, 2026 from 6 to 8pm, and the exhibition is on view through September 6th, 2026.

“Kids Flying: Aaron, Lydia and Ralph Jr.” by Margo Cooper, 1999, from the series Cora courtesy of the artist and the Photographic Resource Center.

Feature Image: From the series Between Them by Mav Fernandez, courtesy of the artist and the Photographic Resource Center.

“Untitled” by Grady Thomas, from the series Once in a Lullaby, courtesy of the artist and the Photographic Resource Center.

“The Ghost Bride” by Stella Johnson, courtesy of the artist and the Photographic Resource Center.

Employing a classic black and white documentary style, Margo Cooper and Mav Fernandez explore family life while Grady Thomas and Stella Johnson tell stories of transitions. Cooper photographed a young mother and her children, highlighting the joy of childhood and childhood play despite the hardships of living in rural poverty. Fernandez, who is an only child, sought to understand the breadth of sibling relationships through dynamic compositions of siblings jumping on a trampoline or two sisters simply lying in a bed together. Thomas gently considered his aging grandparents as they navigate hospice care. Intimate prints of his grandmother in bed, her wrinkled hand and an abandoned walker are deeply moving. Johnson’s “Ghost Bride,” featuring a misty veil becomes a metaphor for the vanishing cultural rituals in the ancient realm of Oaxaca, a place she has photographed for decades.

“Poached Eggs” by Daniel Jackson, 2022, from the series Evy, courtesy of the artist and the Photographic Resource Center.

From the series Everything Lasts a Lifetime by Paul Cary Goldberg, courtesy of the artist and the Photographic Resource Center.

Daniel Jackson and Paul Cary Goldberg’s photographs are very different from each other, but at heart, they offer views on metamorphosis and endurance. Jackson’s triptychs foreground his niece as she undergoes chemotherapy, emphasizing the importance of home and place in recovery from disease. A plate of apples takes on deep significance, urging the viewer to appreciate the details around us. Goldberg’s unframed images printed on canvas and embellished with paint are an affirmation of the ephemeral. A silhouetted shadow of a head and a vanishing figure are achingly somber despite their presentation as tactile objects.

“Interruption” by Hannah Altman, from the series We Will Return to You, courtesy of the artist and the Photographic Resource Center.

“Majesty” by Anastasia Sierra, from the series The Witching Hour, courtesy of the artist and the Photographic Resource Center.

“Project Car” by Zachary P. Stephens, courtesy of the artist and the Photographic Resource Center.

Hannah Altman, Anastasia Sierra, Zachary P. Stephens and Mari Saxon engage with myth and memory in constructed color images that are by turns melancholy, humorous and surreal. Employing Jewish folklore and ritual, Altman’s backlit spray of water from a hose refreshes a young woman in a spiritual “mikvah” while Sierra’s sunlit compositions speak to the tension and complexity of motherhood by mining her own fears and dreams. In contrast, Stephens builds playful compositions in cinematic images that evoke the joy and sometimes violent look of play. His daughter’s Ken doll is burning at the stake while the harried father keeps an ancient Volvo in tune with three young children in attendance, each with their own ideas. Saxon’s surreal images are inspired by the dark undercurrents of Russian fairy tales, but her supine bride hints at the tragedy of Ophelia.

From the series Untold Fairytale by Mari Saxon, courtesy of the artist and the Photographic Resource Center.

“Iskele” by Chantal Zakari, courtesy of the artist and the Photographic Resource Center.

Still life and architecture can convey the measure of a place and a life. Chantal Zakari’s studies of abandonment, destruction and construction in Turkey affirm that country’s cycles of crisis and prosperity. Harsh mid-day light illuminating an abandoned resort suggest despair, while the soft light at the end or start of the day, filtering through a construction sight, offers a more hopeful note. Steve Genatossio’s intimate studies of a cluttered kitchen are a symbolic reminders of the prosaic tools and detritus that we use in daily life. Two chairs by a window imply a human presence, yet I can intuit their passing.