Shannon Benine, MFA
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Shannon Benine joined University of La Verne in 2019 and as an Associate Professor and Director of the Irene Carlson Gallery of Photography within the Department of Photography. She is a North American artist, curator and educator known for her dedication to advancing the discourse on expanded documentary photography, interdisciplinary approaches to art and community engagement.
Benine constantly asks the question, what mechanisms are there to support marginalized communities from the decisions of hegemonic systems of power? Her work examines the aesthetics, politics and ethics of past and present documentary techniques while it engages the viewer in a discussion and debate about the United State’s politically charged history of human rights. Drawing from years of intensive artistic research, Benine combines photography, video, sound, text and archival materials to create multimedia installations that reimagine existing methodologies within the broad scope of documentary practices. Benine’s work has been held in several collections including the Museum of Contemporary Photography in Chicago, the National Centre of Contemporary Art in Moscow, Russia and the Kalaupapa National Historic Museum in Hawai’i. She has received grant support from multiple institutions including the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs, Midwest Society for Photographic Education and the Greater Columbus Arts Council. Her work has been exhibited at the Columbus Museum of Art in Columbus, Ohio; the Catherine Edelman Gallery in Chicago, Illinois and the Griffin Museum of Photography in Winchester, Massachusetts. Benine holds an MFA in Photography from the University of Illinois at Chicago and a BFA in Photography and BA in Interdisciplinary Visual Arts from the University of Washington in Seattle. |
