Image: “Shadow of Snopes Boxing Sign on the Trolley Barn, Poughkeepsie NY”
www.monicachurch.org
STATEMENT
I’ve lived in the City of Poughkeepsie since 2002 and began documenting it’s streets, homes, buildings and people in 2008. I am especially interested in the humble spaces that one passes by. Each facade holds a particular history showing human interactions that share secrets about the spaces they inhabit. My photographs document these walls in hope of provoking a memory of place, and to share with the new pandemic arrivals a visual archive of the layering of images and histories over time in a city that is rapidly transforming.
BIO
Born and raised in Middlebury, VT, Monica Church has lived in New York’s Hudson
Valley for over two decades. She is an abstract artist working in painting, collage and
photography. Church has been photographing in the City of Poughkeepsie for over ten
years documenting it’s transitional and overlooked spaces.
Church has won two Arts Mid-Hudson Individual Artist Fellowships— one for
photography and one for painting. Other awards include the Silvermine Guild Arts
Center’s Steven Madwed Prize for Photography and The Rosenthal Foundation Best in
Show Award; a Carolyn Grant from Vassar College; and a fellowship for a six-week
residency at Woman’s Studio Workshop.
Church has had numerous solo shows including at Garrison Art Center, Vassar
College’s Palmer Gallery; Womenswork.ART; Dutchess Community College Gallery;
Chapman Friedman Gallery, Louisville, KY; University of Kentucky’s Center for
Contemporary Art; LoRiver Arts Gallery and Go North, both in Beacon, NY. Blue Leaf
Gallery featured her work at the Dublin Art Fair and the Edinburgh Art Fair.
Her artwork is included in both private and institutional collections including, Binney and
Smith, Easton PA; Manugistics Ltd, Rockville, MD; Community Bank, Lexington KY;
Copper Canyon Press, Port Townsend WA; The University of Kentucky Art Museum,
Lexington KY; Vassar College Libraries Archives and Special Collections, and Women’s
Studio Workshop, among others.
Church studied printmaking at Rhode Island School of Design, n.d., and has a B.A. in
Visual Arts from Bennington College and an M.F.A. in Painting from The University of
Kentucky.
For more information visit Monica’s website: monicachurch.org and follow her on
Instagram: @monicadchurch
