Photographers on Photographers: Joshua Mokry in Dialog with Dionne Lee

Every August we ask the earlier Top 25 Lenscratch Student Prize Winners to interview a hero or a mentor, providing a chance for dialog and connection. Today Joshua Mokry and Dionne Lee are in dialogue. Thank you to each of the artists.

I first met Dionne Lee whereas I used to be in graduate faculty, when she participated within the Land Arts of the American West program at Texas Tech University. At the time, I by no means imagined how a lot of an impression Lee’s work would have on me as I started researching caves. I chosen Dionne Lee as a result of her observe resonates with most of the questions that form my very own. While our initiatives have interaction with completely different environments and histories, I’m drawn to the way in which wherein Lee approaches the panorama and her capacity to ascertain a relationship with it by her work.

I’m notably thinking about the way in which Lee’s collages and drawings function alongside her images. Rather than feeling separate from the photographic picture, they turn into extensions of it, serving as factors of contact between the artist’s hand and the image airplane. These gestures additional join physique to position, creating house for the panorama to take part within the dialog.

This dialog happened over a cellphone name through the summer time of 2026.

Dionne Lee is an artist working throughout varied mediums together with images, collage, and video. Her work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, together with the Museum of Modern Art, Storm King Art Center, Swiss Institute, Carnegie Museum of Art, and The Barbican amongst others. Lee’s work was included within the 2024 Whitney Biennial and in 2025 the twelfth International SITE Santa Fe Biennial. Artist residencies embrace The Center for Photography at Woodstock (2019), Light Work (2021), and Chinati Foundation (2022). Her first monograph “Currents”, printed by Aperture, is out now. She is a 2025 Guggenheim Fellow.

 

Joshua Mokry: What received you began in images?

Dionne Lee: My father gave me a 35mm [camera] after I was a teen, and it simply turned a superb inventive outlet for me. I grew up in New York City, and my entry into image-making was road images and making portraits of my pals and strangers. I’m an introvert, however one thing about being behind the digicam supplied me a confidence and energy to method strangers and take their image. I believe a number of photographers expertise a sense of permission by possessing a digicam.

When I went to varsity, I received extra experimental in my work and entered a darkroom for the primary time.

Joshua Mokry: What often comes first for you: a spot, a picture, a query, or one thing else completely?

Dionne Lee: There isn’t a single, dependable factor that comes first. I accumulate a number of books for collage–possibly I’ll see a picture I need to lower out, recreate not directly, or discover compelling for no matter purpose. It additionally occurs within the subject; I will be someplace and really feel compelled by one thing within the panorama. Sometimes it’s a query. There is not any method; creativity is rarely that lower and dry.

Joshua Mokry: The course of can appear to be it’s contained in a field, and also you go to 1 place to begin creating, but it surely’s actually like all the pieces is natural and compounded.

Dionne Lee: For positive. I can go someplace and be struck by one thing and know that I must return and make one thing. But largely, I’m dwelling my life, observing, writing, studying, and issues come up on their very own. It’s intangible. 

Joshua Mokry: Yeah, I’m the identical means. I’ll get inspiration from a YouTube video a few science experiment, and that doesn’t essentially result in a picture, but it surely’ll result in an concept that may then result in a picture.

Dionne Lee: Totally.

Joshua Mokry: When you’re within the subject, what makes you determine that a spot is price returning to repeatedly quite than merely working in or photographing as soon as?

Dionne Lee: I are likely to go “into the field” in bursts–generally it’s by a residency alternative and different instances it’s me going to a spot native to me. I am going out to gather info, discover my questions, and encountering what you pose in your first query: “what comes first?” When I get residence from a distant or prolonged subject expertise, I discover the work will be realized. I make a lot work the place I stay, and it’s like I’m all the time returning. Historically, I haven’t had a lot luck making work removed from the place I stay. I must course of all of it first.

There is that this creek by a home I used to stay in. It took 5 minutes to stroll to from my home. I’d go there on a regular basis as a result of it was simple to get to. I made a complete exhibition in that house [Currents at Cushion Works in San Francisco in 2024], inside a span of some months. Sometimes I’d go to the creek and simply assume, stroll round, different instances I’d make some photographs and seize video–all of it was equally precious. When I’m exploring unfamiliar locations, I don’t really feel that snug; it may be disorienting. It’s extra fruitful after I can encounter issues again and again.

Joshua Mokry: In relation to that spot that you just’re speaking about the place you made all these works, and possibly others that you can imagine, how did that place change for you over time? Like after, you understand, the fifth or tenth go to, at what level do you cease photographing and begin constructing a relationship with it? Or vice versa.

Dionne Lee: The relationship comes first. I get freer and extra resourceful as a result of I’m attempting to determine ‘what else can I do here?’ I did begin with doing these rock drawings the place at first I used to be simply putting objects or drawing on the rocks with chalk. Then, I began drawing them with water as an alternative. Then, I used to be filming. I put this string within the water that I attempted to maintain in a spiral form, and I adopted that down the creek.

Joshua Mokry: Oh, yeah. [Lee is talking about the creation of Currents II, Single channel video, 18:51 min., loop (2024)]

Dionne Lee: …Then I moved. I’m not terribly removed from that location–as an alternative of a 5-minute stroll, it’s in all probability extra like 30. Still shut, however not shut sufficient, I assume! I typically say I wish to work hyperlocal. 

Joshua Mokry: I had a query going off of that… You have been speaking about [Currents II and other] works which are a bit extra intimate with nature and really near the bottom, in comparison with a number of the collage works that really feel vital in opposition to conventional makes use of of images. Do you discover a connection level between that consolation you’re feeling out within the subject invitations you to make extra works which are extra intimate with nature – much less about critique and extra about reconstruction and restoration? 

Dionne Lee: Yes and No. Yes, I do assume that it helps. Kind of like how I mentioned earlier than, opening myself up and feeling a bit freer in an area. I believe there are additionally ranges of permission, which might come by familiarity. So sure, in that sense, it does. However, I’ve turn into much less thinking about critique and extra thinking about simply growing that relationship [with place]. The critique is there as a result of I really feel like I attempt to work in opposition to a sure type of trope in panorama images. But I don’t need to all the time really feel like I’m making work in response to a sure section of the canon. I give it some thought extra as I’m simply including extra info.

I actually see a cupboard. If Ansel [Adams] is within the cupboard, and Carleton [Watkins] is within the cupboard, what does it appear like for my {photograph} to be in there too? How does that develop or add to this panorama story that we’ve constructed?

I strive to not really feel an obligation to all the time be instantly critiquing. I believe the work is doing that, however I don’t know if my motivations all the time must be coming from that place precisely. My perspective isn’t solely aware of the work of others.

Joshua Mokry: I like that analogy with the cupboard.

Dionne Lee: Yeah. It’s much less stress, truthfully. I believe there’s additionally that line between what your work is doing after which what you select to say or converse as an artist. You have to go away one thing for the work to say.

Joshua Mokry: Some collages in your work stay extra recognizable, like of a spot or a factor inside nature. I’m fascinated with Warnings I, Warnings II, collectively on the bottom to kind the base- I can see these aerial views of a airplane crash, otherwise you’re constructing a hearth mattress or a shelter. Whereas works within the Fault Condition collection are a little bit bit extra summary for me. Almost prefer it’s topographical, such as you’re creating your individual panorama…What guides that motion between that descriptive, extra representational imagery versus the abstracted?

Dionne Lee: For Fault Condition, I used to be attempting to assume extra in regards to the histories embedded within the earth by geology and mapping. I used to be additionally leaning right into a sparser collage technique. I used to be doing a number of rubbings, graphite on paper, and drawing onto the again of the paper to create an embossed floor.

Earlier, my work [including Warnings] actually centered on themes of survival, which felt very quick. I made a number of that work in 2019, and the pandemic got here shortly after. It was surreal to be making work by the pandemic after spending a lot time fascinated with survival. The panic and immediacy of that point confirmed up within the work, I believe. Over the years, as I turned extra thinking about geology, I slowed down, which isn’t shocking contemplating the character of that self-discipline. I believe that’s what guided a special course of. It invited extra destructive house within the work, extra respiration room, and easily much less footage…which is the distinction between these two durations of constructing.

Joshua Mokry: I’m particularly pondering of the picture the place you prolonged the strains of the shelter [netting (2019) and loose structure (2019)]. It nearly feels just like the drawings have gotten extensions to the precise images themselves. There is a fluidity the place drawings really feel like extensions of images and pictures really feel like drawings. What does drawing offer you that images alone doesn’t? What does drawing will let you discover?

Dionne Lee: Yeah, that’s a superb query. Photography is the one factor I’m formally skilled in. Of course, I needed to take drawing and portray in undergrad foundations, however I by no means did these issues once more. As my observe developed, I’d run up in opposition to moments the place footage weren’t doing what I wanted them to do–it felt like an natural flip in direction of mark-making.

The first time I drew on a print was really an accident. I take notes on the again of my prints within the darkroom, and one time I unintentionally wrote on the emulsion facet of the paper (the facet that uncovered below an enlarger). This accident received me out of this treasured and scared mindset I believe we’re skilled to have as photographers. I used to be motivated to loosen up and see what occurs if I do the improper factor.

For that picture [Netting (2019) and Loose Structure (2019)] that you just’re speaking about the place I’m extending the strains: that was me attempting to think about the shelter persevering with but additionally coming aside. It’s nonsensical. It stops being a shelter.

I believe it [drawing] offers me a way of freedom. Drawing is a technique to fill within the gaps or add complexity. What can exist past the body of the picture?

Joshua Mokry: Looking again during the last decade of your observe, what query are you continue to asking that images has not but helped you reply?

Dionne Lee: Well, it’s a latest query, although it’s been with me for a few years; I’m attempting to consider what images really is. I’ve been reframing my understanding of images as beginning with fossils. I’m fascinated with the plant fossil as the primary panorama {photograph} and the way the Earth has been documenting itself lengthy earlier than we confirmed up. What might it imply if we settle for that we weren’t the primary to doc the Earth? Could it humble us and shift our relationship to energy and land? Again, fascinated with that submitting cupboard, what if fossils have been in there too?

That reframe could be very liberating within the sense of: I’m collaborating in such an enormous historical past that predates people and even predates the digicam. I assume that is one thing that images has helped me look at, if I’m these issues and fascinated with them as a type of images.

In phrases of ‘what has it not helped me answer?’ I believe a number of artists would possibly really feel this fashion, which is, I’m extra within the questions. I don’t know if I’ve ever checked out images for solutions. It has helped me reply questions, however that’s not why I look to it. It is my instrument for asking questions, and people questions carry extra questions.

Joshua Mokry: What artist are you specifically and fascinated with?

Dionne Lee: Well, one in every of them I considered for a few years, and I’m going to be in a present together with her work in Houston this September. [Divination: Beverly Buchanan & Dionne Lee, September 3, 2026, Nina and Michael Zilkha Gallery, Contemporary Arts Museum Houston]

Joshua Mokry: Oh, I’ll be there! I’m excited.

Dionne Lee: Great. Yeah, you need to come. It’s with Beverly Buchanan. She’s somebody whose work I’ve cherished for a really very long time. I took a visit to go to her piece Marsh Ruins on the coast of Georgia a few years in the past, which is a piece I view as a grasp examine in responding to histories embedded within the panorama. This was my first go to to Sea Islands, a area of latest resonance inside my observe as it’s an intersection of problems with land rights, historical past, and id that additional inform my understanding of the complexities embedded within the American panorama. It’s very particular to be in a present together with her. She’s been on my thoughts for years, earlier than the exhibition even got here to be. In my studio, I attempt to grasp up images of artists that I consider as my studio guides. Beverly’s all the time been up. Ana Mendieta has all the time been up. Yoko Ono has all the time been up. Those have been my large three for a very long time.

I just lately received the e book Generalization by Tania Pérez Córdova, which I’ve actually been having fun with. I’m a fan of Veronica Ryan; I used to be delivered to tears at her exhibition, Unruly Objects (2025), on the Pulitzer Arts Foundation in St. Louis. I additionally simply went to the 59th Carnegie International and noticed the most effective video works I’ve seen in a very long time: What Is Your Favorite Primitive (2023) by Yi Li-Fan. Oh my gosh…floored me. A very sensible and humorous investigation into the ethics of software program instruments designed for picture manufacturing.

I’m additionally all the time seeking to Gabrielle L’Hirondelle Hill.

Joshua Mokry: Oh yeah, she gave you the interview within the e book [Dionne Lee: Currents, published by Aperture]. That was an exquisite interview.

Dionne Lee: Yeah, she’s a pal. We went to grad faculty collectively. She’s one in every of my favourite artists.

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Joshua Mokry is an American artist primarily based in Texas working with images, sculpture, and efficiency. He obtained an MFA diploma in images at Texas Tech University in 2026. Mokry’s work has been exhibited each nationally and internationally, with just a few choose galleries together with the Galería Central at Centro Nacional de las Artes (CENART) in Mexico City, Mexico (2026), the Northlight Gallery in Phoenix, Arizona (2025), and the FLOOR_ Gallery in Seoul, South Korea (2023). He has obtained an Honorable Mention for the Innovate Grant and was a part of Lenscratch’s 2025 Student Prize: Top 25 to Watch listing. His work has been included in a number of publications together with ZONE’s 4th collective e book titled ZIVNE and Float Magazine’s Impactful Photography.

Instagram: @jamokry