A Crack in the World

• Photographer
  Barbara Kyne, United States
• Website
  http://barbarakyne.com

What is the nature of reality? I ask this question as I work through
an organic process of discovery with an emphasis on the sentience
of all living entities and their oneness in consciousness. I follow
my subjects through the cycles of life, death and rebirth, often and
surprisingly connecting pathos and joy.

The sensory artifacts I make provide a conduit for others to
directly experience new perceptions. Though often abstracted, the
work seems more real than the actual subject might normally look.
It is created digitally to take advantage of immediate feedback and
allows me to push past surface appearances and use the optics of
the camera to expand vision, showing either less detail where
normally expected, or emphasizing the unexpected, underlying or
overlooked.

Through my photographic practice, I have observed that since
human senses perceive reality radically differently and at times
with exponentially less sensitivity or intelligence than other
biological species, how could we possibly know What is real? Our
limited senses and the machines we build to extend them do not
equip us to answer that question. We don’t know as much about
dirt as the grass does, or as much about navigation as the
monarch butterfly. We haven’t seen past our Universe. But with
insights we are discovering through science, and with discipline
and attention, we can develop abilities in various practices such as
art, meditation, lucid dreaming, etc. and use them to look for
clues to the great existential questions which have implications for
the future of the Earth itself.

What we think of as important, worthy or beautiful can and ought
to be shaken up by seeing through the eyes of others. Though
many interpretations can be gleaned from the work, creating
empathy is a goal -- for ourselves and other sentient beings on
the planet.

• Biography
  Barbara Kyne is a nationally exhibited artist. Among the shows she has been in are: The Oakland Museum of Art's, What is Art For?, The Triton Museum of Art in Santa Clara, CA, The Bedford Gallery in Walnut Creek, CA and The Kala Institute in Berkeley, CA. Barbara's selected bibliography includes The New York Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Oakland Tribune and Artweek, for which she also contributed as a writer and photographer. Barbara has taught photography extensively including at City College of San Francisco, and most recently at Lebanon Valley College in Annville, PA. She has also lectured at the Society for Photographic Education. Barbara received her BA in photography from Brooks Institute of Photography in Santa Barbara, CA, and her MA in Studio Arts from John F. Kennedy University in Orinda, CA Barbara was born in Hoboken, New Jersey, United States, in 1961.
• Awards
  Honorable Mention, PX3, Prix de la Photographie Paris, 2015. The body of work, "A Crack in the World" was published by Daylight Books in 2016 and subsequently exhibited as a solo show at Krowswork Gallery in Oakland, California.