Nationality American | ||
 | ||
Anita Douthat (born 1950) is an American photographer that creates work "in areas that could be called experimental, and painstakingly ethereal images of transfixing and even transcending beauty."
Contents
Biography
Anita Douthat received a bachelor of science from the Institute of Design at the Illinois Institute of Technology (Chicago, IL) in 1972 and a master of fine arts from the University of New Mexico (Albuquerque, NM) in 1986. Her photograms have been widely featured in exhibitions at the Cincinnati Art Museum (Cincinnati, OH); Indianapolis Art Center (Indianapolis, IN); Ross Art Museum at Ohio Wesleyan University (Delaware, OH); and the Weston Art Gallery in the Aronoff Center for the Arts (Cincinnati, OH). Her work is included in numerous public and private collections including the Cincinnati Art Museum (Cincinnati, OH); Museum of Fine Arts (Houston, TX); Columbus Museum of Art (Columbus, OH); University of New Mexico Art Museum (Albuquerque, NM); Fidelity Investments (Covington, KY); and Medpace (Cincinnati, OH). She has been the recipient of grants from the National Endowment for the Arts, the New England Foundation for the Arts, and the Kentucky Foundation for Women. From 1985-92, she was curator of the Photographic Resource Center at Boston University and is currently associate director of the Carl Solway Gallery (Cincinnati, OH). Born in Cincinnati, she currently resides in Alexandria, Kentucky.
Artistic Process
Douthat doesn’t typically use a camera, much less digital video — sunlight is her lens for creating photograms, a variation of photography that dates to the 19th century and was championed in the 20th century by avant-gardist Man Ray. She places found objects, chosen for their transparent or opaque qualities, atop photosensitive paper and lets the light burn through to create silhouette-like imagery. Later, the paper is chemically gold-toned — it gets a purplish color — and fixed for permanence. Douthat’s photograms can be startling in their size. Especially so are works from her Alterations series — life-size images that capture the essence and aura of women’s apparel, including wedding dresses.