Online Artist Talk: Eric Kunsman, Life-Lines Throughout the United States
Wednesday, August 13, 5:00 - 6:00pm Pacific Time
Free for members, $10 for non-members
Register before August 12 at 6:00pm. You will receive a zoom link the evening before the talk.
Please join award winning photographer and educator, Eric Kunsman, as he shares images and information from his long-term project, "Life-Lines Throughout the United States." Eric’s project Life-Lines Throughout the United States expands his prior project Felicific Calculus: Technology as a Social Marker of Race, Class, and Economics in Rochester, New York. Both projects are visual sociology in nature, where data, maps, and audio stories are components used alongside his photographs. These bodies of work look at the relationship of race and socioeconomics with a technology that many individuals feel is obsolete, but serves as a necessity for many forgotten people. Eric will lead a discussion on how these two photographic projects have been used to raise awareness of often forgotten necessities and how he has grown through this photographic project. He will also share how he has assembled a team to become part of the solution by creating the Good Phone Project.
Don't miss this fascinating and informative talk with one of the great photography educators of our time.
Bio
Eric T. Kunsman (b. 1975) was born and raised in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. While in high school, he was heavily influenced by the death of the steel industry and its place in American history. Exposure to Walker Evans's work during this time hooked Eric onto photography. Eric had the privilege of studying under Lou Draper, who became Eric’s most formative mentor. He credits Lou with influencing his approach as an educator, photographer, and contributing human being.
He is a photographer and book artist based in Rochester, New York. Eric works at the Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) as an Assistant Professor in the Visual Communications Studies Department at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf and is an adjunct professor for the School of Photographic Arts & Sciences. He also owns Booksmart Studio, a fine art digital printing studio that specializes in numerous techniques and services for photographers and book artists on a collaborative basis. Eric also serves as a board member for CEPA Gallery in Buffalo, NY.
Eric is a recipient of the 2025 CENTER Santa Fe’s Callanan Excellence in Teaching Award, and a 2024 JGS Fellowship for Photography Recipient from The New York Foundation for the Arts. He was a 2022 nominee for Prix Pictet- Humans and named one of 10 B&W photographers to watch of 2018 by BWGallerist; B&W Best Photographers of the Year 2019 & 2021 by Dodho Magazine; won the Association of Photography (UK) Gold Award for Open Series in 2019 and a finalist in 2024; Critical Mass Finalist Top 200 Critical Mass 2019, 2020, 2021; Top 50 Critical Mass in 2022; Top 15 Photographers for the Rust Belt Biennial; and LensCulture’s New Visions Award 2025, Critics' Choice 2022 and B&W Jurors’ Pick 2021. His Project Felicific Calculus was also awarded a Warhol Foundation Grant through CEPA Gallery in Buffalo, NY.
Eric has held over 40 solo exhibitions and counting. His work has been exhibited in over 250 galleries and museums and featured in Bloomberg Businessweek, Harper’s Magazine, LensWork, Loupe Magazine, Dodho, B&W Photography, Analog Explorations, All About Photo, Black+White Photography (UK), The Washington Post, and Dek Unu. He has also been featured in online articles by All About Photo, F-Stop Magazine, Analog Forever Magazine, Catalyst: Interview, Texas Photo Society, and others.
To learn more about Eric, please visit his website: www.erickunsman.com
