Arrangements in Green and Black
Portrait of the Photographer’s Mother Series
June 6–10, 2012

  • From the series Arrangements in Green and Black by Aline Smithson

    From the series Arrangements in Green and Black by Aline Smithson

  • From the series Arrangements in Green and Black by Aline Smithson

    From the series Arrangements in Green and Black by Aline Smithson

  • From the series Arrangements in Green and Black by Aline Smithson

    From the series Arrangements in Green and Black by Aline Smithson

“This series had serendipitous beginnings. I found a small print of Whistler’s painting, Arrangement in Grey and Black: Portrait of the Painter’s Mother, at a neighborhood garage sale. The same weekend, I found a leopard coat and hat, a 1950s cat painting, and what looked like the exact chair from Whistler’s painting. That started me thinking about the idea of portraiture, the strong compositional relationships going on within Whistler’s painting, and the evocative nature of unassuming details.

The series incorporates traditional photography techniques, yet becomes richer with the treatment of hand painting. It is my intent to have the viewer see the work in a historical context with the addition of color, and at the same time, experience Whistler’s simple, yet brilliant formula for the composition.

My patient 85-year-old mother posed in over 20 ensembles, but unfortunately passed away before seeing the finished series. I am grateful for her sense of humor and the time this series allowed us to be together.”—Aline Smithson

Artists

Aline Smithson

Founder and Editor, Lenscratch

After a career as a New York Fashion Editor and working along side the greats of fashion photography, Aline Smithson discovered the family Rolleiflex and never looked back. Now represented by galleries in the U.S. and Europe and published throughout the world, Aline continues to create her award-winning photography with a 50-year-old camera. Her work has been featured in numerous publications including PDN (the cover), The PDN Photo Annual, Communication Arts Photo Annual, Eyemazing, Soura, Visura, Fraction, Artworks, Lenswork Extended, Shots, Pozytyw, and Silvershotz magazines. She has exhibited widely including solo shows at the Griffin Museum of Photography, the Fort Collins Museum of Contemporary Art, The Tagomago Gallery in Barcelona, and Wallspace Gallery in Seattle. In 2012, Aline received the Rising Star Award from the Griffin Museum of Photography for her contributions to the photography community. She writes and edits the blog, Lenscratch, has been the Gallery Editor for Light Leaks Magazine, is a contributing writer for a variety of publications, and has been curating and jurying exhibitions for a number of galleries photo organizations. She has been an annual juror for Critical Mass, and a reviewer at Photo Festivals around the coutnry. Though she was nominated for The Excellence in Photographic Teaching Award from 2008 – 2012 and for The Santa Fe Prize in Photography in 200, she considers her children her greatest achievement. Aline lives and teaches in Los Angeles.