Lisa Elmaleh is a landscape photographer who uses an 8 x 10" camera and the collodion on glass process. This process from the mid 1800's requires an on-site darkroom, which is built into the back of her truck. She attended the School of Visual Arts in New York, and became inspired by the historical landscape photographers of the American West such as Carleton Watkins and William Henry Jackson. By documenting the Everglades in Florida, an ecosystem that has lost most of the land to urban and agricultural use, Elmaleh hopes to preserve an essence of the Everglades. The freshwater flowing into the national park is engineered, making it an ecosystem on life support, "alive but diminished". The following images come from the series Everglades, Lonesome Valley, and American Folk.
"Since 2008, I have been working on a series of photographs in the Everglades. As a native of South Florida, the Everglades is an ecosystem that has shaped my own history. The Everglades is a series of ecosystems that thrive on freshwater flowing south from Lake Okeechobee. Agriculture, urban development, and a complex series of canals have redirected and polluted the freshwater flowing into the Everglades. "
In the 1800s, the Everglades were viewed as a landscape to develop and conquer, to alter permanently. To date, more than half of the Everglades have been repurposed for urban and agricultural use. Freshwater flowing into the park is engineered, reads the brochure given to all visitors of Everglades National Park. With the help of pumps, floodgates, and retention ponds along the park's boundary, the Everglades is presently on life support, alive but diminished.
In Everglades, Lisa Elmaleh returned to her native South Florida. In a project that lasted from 2008 until 2016, Elmaleh examined her native landscape, photographing the flora and fauna of the Everglades, the only ecological system of its kind. Inspired by early landscape photographers of the American West, Elmaleh spent her time in the Everglades using a large format 8×10 camera and the wet collodion glass negative process, a nineteenth century process requiring the images be exposed and developed on site in a small portable cardboard darkroom. In this way, Elmaleh hopes to preserve an essence of the Everglades, a land we are rapidly losing without knowing the magnitude of our loss.
The Everglades project was the winner of the Aaron Siskind Foundation award, the Puffin Foundation Grant, and the Everglades National Park Artist Residency (AIRIE).
Art, Activism, Policy, and Power is an educational framework offering resources and opportunities for high school students to engage with artist-activists. The program focuses on various justice topics, utilizing the MoCP’s exhibitions, visiting artists, and collections as teaching tools. Students explore how artists incorporate research into their work to amplify urgent social issues, while also gaining insight into the power of the arts in advancing activism.
Jaume Llorens, born in Porqueres, near Girona, has been passionate about photography since his teenage years. Though he began exhibiting his work later in life, his artistic journey has quickly gained recognition on the international stage. His work is characterized by a deep, contemplative connection with nature, where silence and observation shape his artistic vision.
His poetic project Gaia, inspired by this reflective approach, earned him the December 2023 Solo Exhibition.
We asked him a few questions about his life and work.
Asiya Al Sharabi is a Yemeni-American visual artist whose work has been recognized both nationally and internationally. She began her career as a journalist and photographer before shifting her focus to artistic photography, using her lens to explore the complexities of identity, culture, and migration. Now based in the U.S., her work is deeply rooted in the experiences of Middle Eastern women, young adults, and immigrants—themes that continue to shape her creative vision.
Círculo Collective is a photography group dedicated to fostering unity and shared humanity during these challenging times. This exclusive collective brings together photographers from five countries: India, Tanzania, Iran, Brazil, and Poland.
In a world increasingly defined by division and conflict, the mission of Círculo Collective holds profound significance. Through their work, they seek to remind us of the connections that bind us and the power of community in overcoming adversity.
We reached out to them with a few questions to gain deeper insights into their project.
Manuela Federl is a journalist and documentary filmmaker with over 15 years of experience. She studied languages, economics, and cultural studies, focusing on the Mapuche people in Chile, which became the subject of her published thesis. In 2016, she founded her company, bergjournalisten, and has since created award-winning documentaries like 100 Hours of Lesbos and THE GAME. Gambling Between Life and Death. For the past two years, she has traveled extensively, documenting social issues through photography and storytelling. Her series The Roma Princesses earned her the January 2024 Solo Exhibition.
Black Box, a memoir by award-winning American photographer Dona Ann McAdams, combines fifty years of black and white photography with the photographer’s own short lyric texts she calls “ditties.” The book brings together McAdams’ striking historical images with personal reflections that read like prose-poems. Her photographs, taken between 1974 and 2024, document astonishing moments and people across decades of American life.
Grace Weston’s staged photography transforms miniature vignettes into powerful narratives that explore psychological themes with a playful yet profound touch. Her meticulously crafted scenes invite viewers to delve into stories of power, identity, and human complexity. Weston’s innovative work has earned international recognition, including winning the November 2023 Solo Exhibition. We asked her a few questions about her life and work.
Tebani Slade is a fine art, street, and documentary photographer whose work bridges continents, blending the raw authenticity of her Australian roots with the vibrant energy of her second home in Barcelona. Known for her thoughtful approach to storytelling, Tebani immerses herself in unfamiliar settings, capturing unscripted moments that reveal profound truths about the world around her.
Mital Patel is an internationally recognized nature and wildlife photographer who focuses on capturing beauty in all its forms—whether natural or manmade. From architecture and landscapes to the creatures of the wild, Patel has a distinct passion for capturing the most remarkable elements of life through his visual representation of movement, emotion and mood. From behind the lens, he strives to bring viewers his very unique view of nature, telling a story without words and conveying a feeling in the abstract. He challenges his audience to let their imaginations run free, taking the journey with him on his travels and opening their minds beyond the confines of static photography.
In each of his pieces, Patel hopes to offer his audience a way to view the world around them a bit differently – to appreciate the beauty of moments and places that are often overlooked. An intrepid traveler and lover of adventure, Patel’s passion for creative and imaginative photography is a great asset to his exploration of the world, which spans six out of the seven continents. His work is admired worldwide for its unique and artistic perspective.
