Kenneth Josephson is recognized as an early and influential practitioner
of Conceptual photography. His black and white images famously layer
pictures within pictures, focusing on the act of picture-making,
offering playful commentary on photographic truth and illusion, and
using the photograph itself to question the veracity of the medium.
Josephson earned a BFA from the Rochester Institute of Technology in
1957, where he studied under Minor White. In 1960, he earned an MS from
the Institute of Design of the Illinois Institute of Technology,
Chicago, where he was strongly influenced by Harry Callahan and Aaron
Siskind. Josephson was a professor at the School of the Art Institute
of Chicago (1967 -1997), and a founding member of the Society for
Photographic Education. He is the receipient of the John Simon
Guggenheim Memorial Foundation fellowship (1972), and two National
Endowment for the Arts fellowships (1975 and 1979). His work is in the
collections worldwide including the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; the Art Institute of Chicago; the
National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian, Washington D.C.; the
Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco; Bibliotheque National, Paris; and
Fotografiska Museet, Stockholm. A retrospective monograph of
Josephson's work was published by the Art Institute of Chicago in 1999.
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