On Leave Fall 2009
Barbara Foster’s photographic imagery, skewed perspective, and color palette become metaphors for the impermeable walls of isolation intuited by place and/or time. The printed works continue the investigation of spaces that embody accumulated histories and experiences, spaces that are not simply historic, but ones that continue to inform the present. They bear witness to the ephemeral quality of all structures and often a naïve sense of personal or group security. Process, meaning the technical or materiality in making the prints, is important to the intrinsic idea driving the work as it is a confluence of materials and the actual practice. Ink, paper, photographic and specialty materials combine to elicit a response that is not immediately obvious, finding kinship among materials and subject.
Foster is currently Professor and Chair of the Art Department teaching in the Printmaking Area. She has been an exchange faculty to the Phillip Institute of Technology in Melbourne, Australia and has been the Chair of Visual Arts of the California State Summer School for the Arts, sited at the California Institute for the Arts. She has been included in the Ucross Foundation Residency Program, Djerassi Resident Artist Program, The Kala Art Institute Resident Fellowship Program, and the Frans Masereel Artist Residency, Belgium. Her work is included in the collections of the Machida International Print Museum, Machida City, Japan; Frans Masereel Centrum Voor Grafiek, Ministry of Flemish Culture, Belgium; The Santa Barbara Museum of Art; The Contemporary Museum, Honolulu, Hawaii; The Oakland Museum of California; and The City of San Francisco.
Education
- M.A. San Francisco State University
- B.A. UC Santa Barbara
