Barbara Blondeau: Fifty Years Later

“Barbara Blondeau was 36 years of age when she succumbed to cancer after a four-year struggle. Her work was cut short in mid-stride…Despite the brevity, however, it is impressive not only in its scope but also its impact and its truth.” (Ron Walker, Intro Barbara Blondeau 1938-1974)

On the 50th Anniversary of her death Stephen Daiter Gallery presents presenting an exhibition and catalogue exploring many visual themes and experimentations from across Barbara Blondeau’s short but vibrant career. On view will be over forty vintage pieces including photograms, collages, early color processes, multiple exposures strip images, totems, sculptural Lucite portraits, cliché-verre, solarizations, and montages which are just a cross-section of works (many unique) made by Blondeau in her lifetime.

Barbara Blondeau was born in Detroit and became interested in art at a young age. She attended the Art Institute of Chicago and graduated with a painting degree in 1961. During her senior year she took a photography class with Kenneth Josephson and a year or two after graduating she enrolled in graduate course studies with Aaron Siskind at the Institute of Design.

At ID, Blondeau first made work reminiscent of her advisor, Joseph Jachna, with intricate and beautifully rendered nature studies. Soon though, she would shift from outside – in, making studio work like nothing she’d done before.  Her series of multiple image “strip” photographs produced in-camera utilizing many different and innovative approaches and revealed “singular contributions of Blondeau’s strips rests in their elusive subject: they are about time and motion, but do not overtly depict either in a readily recognizable form. There is no way to discern if a strip picture took an hour or ten seconds, or to fully grasp the relationship of movements that created the image in the first place.” (Amanda N. Bock, author, “What is Creativity, Essentially, But Discovery” Barbara Blondeau Photographs 1964-1974, (essay) Barbara Blondeau, Fifty Years Later). These elongated works became her thesis at the school earning her the MS in photography in 1968.

While at ID Blondeau taught for two years at St. Mary’s College in Indiana and after graduating, she was hired at Moore College of Art. In Philadelphia she was among many fellow ID graduates already in the city including William Larson, now at Tyler, Ray Metzker at Philadelphia College of Art, Tom Porett as well. Blondeau lasted a several semesters at Moore, but was soon hired by PCA. She was a good influence on her students challenging them with high expectations and encouraging them to push their limits. It was during her tenure at PCA that Blondeau was diagnosed with breast cancer. Though it was a grim prognosis, Blondeau’s outlook was not, as her late-in-life partner, Joan Redmond recalled, “she never stopped looking forward and making photographs, even taking her camera to the hospital. The challenge and serendipity of experimentation, learning new techniques, using new materials, and stretching boundaries, all drove her onward. The curiosity she brought to everything she did, energized her. Ever positive and yet knowing the odds, she still applied for a National Endowment Grant with her final black border series which tracked her experience as a cancer patient.”

Barbara Blondeau passed away on Christmas Eve in 1974, leaving behind thousands of photographs and unique pieces in her archive. Carefully attended to by the Visual Studies Workshop for all these years, Stephen Daiter Gallery is now pleased to represent the Estate with the VSW.