2026: Tracing Light; Cameraless Photography by Anne Arden McDonald | Campus Gallery | School of Visible & Performing Arts

January 30 – March 31, 2026 | Opening Reception: Tuesday, February 3, 5–7 PM, Artist Talk 5:30 PM (snow day Feb 4) | Closing Reception: Tuesday, March 31, 5–7 PM

The UMass Dartmouth CVPA Campus Gallery is proud to current a solo exhibition, Tracing Light: Cameraless Photography by Anne Arden McDonald. A reception will likely be held on Tuesday, February 3, from 5–7 PM within the CVPA Campus Gallery, positioned on the primary flooring of the CVPA constructing at 285 Old Westport Road, Dartmouth, MA 02747. An artist speak is deliberate for five:30 PM on the gallery in the course of the reception. Light refreshments will likely be served. Visitor parking for this occasion solely is in Lots 5, 6, 8, and 8A.

Additionally, there will likely be a closing reception on Tuesday, March 31, from 5–7 PM with the artist current. All occasions are free and open to the general public.

Anne Arden McDonald is a New York City-based visible artist who creates pictures on photographic paper with out the usage of a digital camera or a adverse. While nonetheless using picture paper, mild, and chemistry, she experiments with historic processes, just like the photogram, to invent new methods of manufacturing pictures. Her strategies contain an unorthodox assortment of supplies and methods drawn from each home and scientific realms.


The work on this exhibition explores circles and spheres as atoms or planets—representing the microcosm and macrocosm of the bodily world—in addition to symbols of progress and wholeness. Featured works embrace current experiments with rust, bubbles, and ceramic glazes, alongside large-scale cameraless scrolls from 2005–2011, a lot of which exceed 100 inches in top. Additionally, the artist created a particular video for this exhibition providing a behind-the-scenes view of her modern processes.

“I am inspired by the dialogue painters and sculptors have with their materials, and the way that interaction informs the resulting image,” states McDonald. “Another inspiration is the scientific method: observing phenomena, formulating a hypothesis, and testing it through experiment. I use careful measurements and note variables to build an image.”

By making use of glue as a resist and navigating the paper floor with alternating photographic chemical substances, McDonald coaxes pictures to emerge within the type of “chemical paintings.” Her experiments vary from portray bleach onto blackened paper to constructing layered piles of glass and eggshells—illuminated by a handheld flashlight—and even cultivating a self-replicating backyard of mould that feeds on silver gelatin paper. Whether created in whole darkness or broad daylight, these additive and reductive processes lead to a sequence of modern pictures that problem our definitions of pictures.

Viera Levitt, UMass Dartmouth Gallery Director, is happy to showcase how McDonald revisits historic processes comparable to Man Ray’s photograms, Pierre Cordier’s chemigrams, and lumen printing.

“Anne is able to create magic out of ephemeral optical situations and chemical reactions,” says Levitt. “Her work underscores a relentless curiosity and patient research into what can be achieved in this medium without a negative. Her willingness to fail and try again is both inspiring and educational, offering a profound lesson to any aspiring or established artist.”

The artist provides: “When I stand in the landscape, the horizon is a circle; when nature goes through four seasons and spring comes again, that is a circle. As each day begins again, circles are a constant experience, either spatially or temporally. For many years, I made self-portraits with a camera, creating narrative images. With this abstract work, I am exploring the deeper story—the older story, the story of all of us, the story of atoms and planets, both circles. It is also an expression of my search for a sense of wholeness.”

About the Artist

Anne Arden McDonald is a Brooklyn, NYC-based visible artist who was born in London, England, and grew up in Atlanta, Georgia. From age 15 to 30, she created photographic self-portraits by constructing installations within the panorama or in deserted interiors and performing privately for her digital camera in these areas. She printed a monograph of this work in 2004. More just lately, she has been making process- and science-inspired pictures which contain each pictures and sculpture. Her work has been exhibited in contexts that vary from self-portrait, staged, ritual, plastic digital camera, vintage course of, and experimental pictures to sculptural installations as massive as a room and as small as a pocket watch.

McDonald’s work has been exhibited broadly; prior to now 40 years, she has had over 50 solo exhibitions in 10 nations and took part in roughly 600 group exhibitions in 20 nations. Her work has been printed in over 215 venues throughout 20 nations—together with Aperture, European Photography, and Eyemazing magazines—and is within the collections of six main museums, together with the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; the Denver Art Museum; the Detroit Institute of Arts; and the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris. She was a Lapine Fellow on the Millay Colony and has been a resident at Saltonstall, Byrdcliffe, Oak Spring Garden, the Sharpe Foundation, and Schrattenberg in Austria.

McDonald taught for six years at Parsons School of Design in New York and has lectured on matters together with staged pictures, self-portraiture, Czech and Slovak pictures, different processes, and her personal inventive apply.

Anne Arden McDonald’s website