Colleen Massari is a fine arts major at UNM, double majoring in photography and Spanish. New Mexico’s landscape drives her to photography, and she aims to do something novel with her nature-oriented work.
Daily Lobo: What kind of things do you photograph?
Colleen Massari: Right now I’m doing really big landscapes in color. The stuff I photograph is completely different than the art I express through drawing, painting, etc. The pictures I take are the pictures I want to hang on my wall, because I want to look at them on a daily basis. That may not be artsy enough for a lot of people, but that’s fine with me. A lot of people are going for shock value, and that’s cool. I live in New Mexico (and) it’s hot. The landscape is sexy. People move here specifically to be inspired by our landscape. I was born here, and I appreciate it very much. I think it is fine to photograph the landscape. It might be cliché, but it may be done. I don’t care, but I’m trying to do something new.
DL: What do you like about the photography program at UNM?
CM: You can’t go to like The Art and Design Center, and get the same education you are getting here. We do strictly fine art and not commercial art. Once you get into the higher level classes, you can specialize in graphic design or something, but it’s strictly fine art, which is cool. We have a lot of really good professors who are really well known. We have three pimpin’ labs, even the dark room, which no one pays attention to, set up. Anything you want you can get. We have equipment you can check out like high-end lighting stuff, medium format cameras, large format cameras. The professors are top notch, the equipment is top notch (and) it’s just a good place to be.
DL: What are some of your inspirations and influences when it comes to photography?
CM: I look at thousands of pictures on a daily basis and I’m like, ‘Oh, I like that’ and everyone that actually inspires me has nothing in common with my art. I was looking at Taryn Simon — she is the most prominent modern female photographer right now. She uses a large-format camera and goes into typically inaccessible areas and photographs really weird stuff. She has this really stunning photograph of a white tiger. But I wouldn’t say I am directly influenced by anyone.
DL: Are there any specific ideas you aim to represent or express through your photos?
CM: With the pictures that I like to show and put most of my energy into, the idea is appreciating the beautiful for what it really is. So many people are caught up in their cell phone, car (and) the city. It drives me nuts to be somewhere where everyone is so caught up. I’m not from the city. I just want to see beautiful things. I read a quote with the idea that art is creating something that you want to see that does not exist, so you have to create it yourself. If I want to look at something every day, I’m going to take a picture of it and tweak it to the point where I think it is perfect and looks good every day.
DL: If you were a piece of artwork what would you be?
CM: I hope I would be an oil painting hanging in the Louvre, with a really gaudy baroque frame, gold leaves — the whole nine yards. That’s what I would hope to be. I would not want to be an Ansel Adams photograph, that’s for sure. I would feel used and reproduced.
