Legendary Arts Administrator Returns To Bucks With "Pieces Of A Life"

DOYLESTOWN, PA — The 60-year photography career of legendary Bucks County arts administrator Bruce Katsiff is on view at Michener Art Museum with the new exhibition, "Pieces of a Life," from April 11 to August 12.

Known as the founding director who established the Michener as a regional destination for American art, Katsiff returns to its galleries as an accomplished Bucks County artist. A graduate from the Rochester Institute of Technology, Katsiff saw early success as a photographer with an appearance at Museum of Modern Art in New York for a 1968 exhibition. Bruce Katsiff: Pieces of a Life features 60 photographs in a retrospective on the artist, guest curated by art historian Dorothy Fisher.

“Bruce Katsiff had a monumental impact on Michener Art Museum as an institution, and we are delighted to welcome him back as a contemporary artist,” said Executive Director and CEO Anne Corso. “I hope this exhibition gives our visitors a fuller picture of the remarkable man who built such a legacy for the artistic community of Bucks County and beyond.”

"Pieces of a Life" includes selections from five distinct bodies of work, with large format portraits of the artist’s friends and neighbors from 1970s Lumberville; selections from his famed Nature Morte series; collaborative platinum prints; and composite digital portraits called "Face Maps."

River Town Portraits, a project Katsiff started to get to know new acquaintances after relocating from Philadelphia in 1968, came to involve trusted friends as the decade progressed. This precedent of artmaking through close connections to artists and friends continued in the landmark series Nature Morte, a consideration of form and mortality through photographs of posed animal remains.

Inspired by a chance encounter with a fatally wounded racoon, Katsiff pursued the limits of the platinum process to create oversized photographs that he said was an “effort to find beauty in images we have been taught to fear and avoid.” The Nature Morte series was only possible thanks to remains gifted by friends and students, including a disinterred dog skeleton pictured in the photograph Pieces of a Life, as Katsiff developed a reputation as the neighborhood “bone guy.”

This photographic pursuit led to deeper artistic collaboration. “The Michener exhibition is the first time the public will get to see the collaborative prints made by Bruce and a number of artist friends, who edited and embellished platinum prints from the Nature Morte series,” said guest curator Dorothy Fisher. “I love these because they bring the best of Bruce’s photography into direct contact with his other legacy—a rich network of artists in and around Bucks County.”

The faces of several of those artists are on display with Katsiff’s most recent series, Face Maps, including painter Peter Paone, woodworker Mira Nakashima, and sculptor George R. Anthonisen. The photographer’s digital-based project reconfigures facial features into bold geometry by compiling many individual images into a single large composite.

Beyond capturing Katsiff’s personal connections to Bucks County’s artistic communities, the Michener retrospective demonstrates his mastery of the evolving medium of photography. “Bruce’s dedication to the history of photography and the specific timeline of his career through the end of the twentieth century means we can also use his work to think more deeply about photography itself,” Fisher said.

Over the span of six decades, Katsiff’s work remained at the technical forefront in the field of photography, while reflecting his position at the center of Bucks County arts during a transitional historical moment. “My pictures are always personal,” Katsiff said. “Photography has served as my personal psychiatrist: a private tool helping me observe, record, understand, and interact with the world.”

A full-color catalogue on the exhibition is available at the Museum Shop with essays by the artist, guest curator Dorothy Fisher, and Jennifer-Navva Milliken, Executive Director and Chief Curator of the Museum for Art in Wood in Philadelphia. An audio guide for Pieces of a Life, narrated by Bruce Katsiff and Dorothy Fisher, will be available for museum visitors and online through the free Bloomberg Connects app.

Major support for Bruce Katsiff: Pieces of a Life is provided by Julie Jensen Bryan, with additional support from The Bullough Family Legacy Trust, David and Gwen Campbell, Kathy and Ted Fernberger, and many friends of the artist.

Related Exhibition Programming

• Bruce Katsiff: Pieces of a Life Members’ Preview Reception takes place on Saturday, April 11, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Free for members. General admission applies.

• History of Photography Before the Digital Revolution with Bruce Katsiff on Wednesday, May 13, from 1 to 2 p.m. The cost is $10 for members and $22 for non-members.

• Gallery Talk with Bruce Katsiff and Guest Curator Dorothy Fisher on Wednesday, June 17, from 2:30 to 3:30 p.m. The cost is $10 for members and $22 for non-members.

Free Second Sundays

Free admission on the following Second Sundays includes access to Bruce Katsiff: Pieces of a Life. Admission is free at Michener Art Museum on the second Sunday of the month with support from Art Bridges Foundation. Free Sundays are from 12 to 5 p.m. on Sunday, April 12, Sunday, May 10, Sunday, June 14, and Sunday, July 12.

About the Artist

Photographer and educator Bruce Katsiff has experimented with a variety of styles, subjects, and media across his six-decade career. Katsiff served as chair of the Art and Music Department at Bucks County Community College for over a decade and was the founding director of Michener Art Museum from 1989 to 2012. He mastered the art of platinum and silver gelatin prints using large-format cameras and he also embraces digital photography in his more recent series.

Katsiff earned his BFA from the Rochester Institute of Technology and his MFA from Pratt Institute. He attended postgraduate studies at Oxford University. His work has been exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art and is held in the collections of the Museum of Fine Arts Houston, the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and Michener Art Museum. Bruce divides his time between Bucks County and Philadelphia with his wife Jo.

The Michener Art Museum is located at 138 S. Pine Street, Doylestown 18901. Hours are Wednesdays–Saturdays, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Sundays 12 to 5 p.m. Open Tuesdays from 1 to –5 p.m. through May 19.