William Greiner
Encyclopedia
William Greiner (born September 8, 1957) in New Orleans, LA is an American
photographer, now living in Baton Rouge, LA.
for Bicycling Magazine, the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times
. Greiner abandoned sports journalism to return to college, earning an A.A. from Bradford College, a B.F.A. from Tufts University/School of the Museum of Fine Art and an M.B.A. from Suffolk University
. During this period, Greiner was introduced to the work of artist/color photographer, William Eggleston
, a great New Orleans photographer who has somewhat been overlooked by bigger names.Bill Owens
, Ralph Eugene Meatyard
, Walker Evans
, Robert Frank
, too many… I love Milton Avery
's work, its flatness and its condensing of the subject to just the necessary elements and details. I also appreciate Edward Hopper
for the emotional impact of his scenes. Ralston Crawford
is an artist I really admire; because he worked so effectively as a painter, print maker and photographer. His images of New Orleans Jazz funerals are really incredible." Blog interview Ratsalad Deluxe 2005.
(NYC) permanent collection, by legendary photography curator John Szarkowski
in 1991. The MOMA acquired work was exhibited in a recent acquisitions show at the museum, two years later, in 1993. This work was also published as a monograph by LSU Press in 1999, by the same title. National Public Radio (NPR) Morning Edition, in April 2000, featured an interview with Greiner, conducted by NPR affiliate station KERA, reporter Bill Zeeble.
Other publications include A NEW LIFE: Stories and Photographs from the Suburban South, work about living in the South, was published by W.W. Norton & Company, Visualizing the Blues , Blues Foundation
/ Dixon Gallery and Gardens
2001 and The Story of the South: 1890-2003 , Ogden Museum of Southern Art/Scala Publishers, (September 2003) , and Baton Rouge Blues , University of Alabama at Birmingham
(2006). FALLEN PARADISE (New Orleans 1995-2005), and LAND'S END (Baton Rouge 2007-2010) were published as a limited edition artist books in 2008 and 2010, respectively.
Also published in 2010 and including Greiner's work along with Alex Harris, Edward Burtynsky
and Will Steacy among others, was the title MIGRATION Lost and Found in America. MIGRATION was just chosen as one of the Top Ten Books of the Year by AMERICAN PHOTO—American Photo
in New Orleans, The Addison Gallery of American Art
in Andover, Massachusetts, Whitney Museum of American Art
and the Museum of Modern Art
in New York, the Smithsonian American Art Museum
in Washington, D.C, the Art Institute of Chicago
in Illinois, the J. Paul Getty Museum
and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
in California.
In 1993, Greiner's work was exhibited in a two man show with William Eggleston
at the Contemporary Arts Center, New Orleans, LA.
William Eggleston and the Color Tradition, an exhibition exploring the art of American color photography over the last 30 years, was on view at the J. Paul Getty Museum
from October 26, 1999 through January 30, 2000. The exhibition included work by : Greiner along with Adam Bartos, Virginia Beahan and Laura McPhee, John Divola
, Jim Dow, Mitch Epstein
, Rhea Garen, Alex Harris, David Husom, Stephen Johnson, William Larson, and Joel Sternfeld
.
In 2003, Greiner's work was selected to be part of Wait Until Dark along with Lewis Baltz
, Todd Hido
, David Levinthal
, Thomas Tulis
, Michael Kenna
, O. Winston Link
, Richard Misrach
, George Tice
and Henry Wessel, Jr.
The exhibition took place at The Williams College Museum of Art
, Williamstown, Massachusetts
.
Along with William Claxton
and Stuart Klipper
, Greiner participated in a music themed exhibition at the Acadiana Center for the Arts, in Lafayette LA, which ran Jan.- March, 2006.
Greiner participated in the group exhibition, ECONOMY OF SCALE , at Hemphill Fine Arts
in Washington , D.C., in 2009. The exhibition also included work by William Christenberry
, Robert Frank
, Sebastiao Salgado
and David Byrne
.
Also in 2009, Greiner participate in the web based book project, "50 States", along with photographers Lisa Kereszi, Brian Ulrich
, Andrew Borowiec and Shawn Records, among others.
Recent solo exhibitions of his work were held at the Louisiana Art & Science Museum in 2008 and the New Orleans Museum of Art
in 2010.
photographer, now living in Baton Rouge, LA.
Career
Greiner began his career as a sports photographer, first working in the National Football League (N.F.L.), at the age of 18, from 1977-1979. He also covered the 1981 and 1982 Tour de FranceTour de France
The Tour de France is an annual bicycle race held in France and nearby countries. First staged in 1903, the race covers more than and lasts three weeks. As the best known and most prestigious of cycling's three "Grand Tours", the Tour de France attracts riders and teams from around the world. The...
for Bicycling Magazine, the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times
The Los Angeles Times is a daily newspaper published in Los Angeles, California, since 1881. It was the second-largest metropolitan newspaper in circulation in the United States in 2008 and the fourth most widely distributed newspaper in the country....
. Greiner abandoned sports journalism to return to college, earning an A.A. from Bradford College, a B.F.A. from Tufts University/School of the Museum of Fine Art and an M.B.A. from Suffolk University
Suffolk University
Suffolk University is a private, non-sectarian, university located in Boston, Massachusetts and with over 16,000 students it is the third largest university in Boston...
. During this period, Greiner was introduced to the work of artist/color photographer, William Eggleston
William Eggleston
William Eggleston , is an American photographer. He is widely credited with increasing recognition for color photography as a legitimate artistic medium to display in art galleries—which, until the 1970s, often tended to privilege work by photographers making black-and-white prints.- Early years...
Influences
"Well obviously (Wm.) Eggleston as I mentioned, but certainly Clarence John LaughlinClarence John Laughlin
Clarence John Laughlin was a United States photographer best known for his surrealist photographs of the U.S. South.Laughlin was born in to a middle class family in Lake Charles, Louisiana. His rocky childhood, southern heritage, and interest in literature influenced his work greatly...
, a great New Orleans photographer who has somewhat been overlooked by bigger names.Bill Owens
Bill Owens (photographer)
Bill Owens is an American photographer, photojournalist, brewer and editor living in Hayward, California. The recipient of a Guggenheim fellowship in 1976 and two NEA Grants, he is best known for his photographs of suburban domestic scenes taken in the East Bay and published in the book Suburbia...
, Ralph Eugene Meatyard
Ralph Eugene Meatyard
Ralph Eugene Meatyard was an American photographer, from Normal, Illinois.-Life & Career:Married to Madelyn McKinney, he moved to Lexington, Kentucky, to continue his trade as an optician. The company he worked for, Tinder-Krausse-Tinder also sold photographic equipment...
, Walker Evans
Walker Evans
Walker Evans was an American photographer best known for his work for the Farm Security Administration documenting the effects of the Great Depression. Much of Evans's work from the FSA period uses the large-format, 8x10-inch camera...
, Robert Frank
Robert Frank
Robert Frank , born in Zürich, Switzerland, is an important figure in American photography and film. His most notable work, the 1958 photobook titled The Americans, was influential, and earned Frank comparisons to a modern-day de Tocqueville for his fresh and skeptical outsider's view of American...
, too many… I love Milton Avery
Milton Avery
Milton Avery was an American modern painter. Born in Altmar, New York, he moved to Connecticut in 1898 and later to New York City.-Biography:...
's work, its flatness and its condensing of the subject to just the necessary elements and details. I also appreciate Edward Hopper
Edward Hopper
Edward Hopper was a prominent American realist painter and printmaker. While most popularly known for his oil paintings, he was equally proficient as a watercolorist and printmaker in etching...
for the emotional impact of his scenes. Ralston Crawford
Ralston Crawford
Ralston Crawford was an American abstract painter, lithographer, and photographer.-Early life:He was born on September 5, 1906, in Canada, at St. Catharines, Ontario, and spent his childhood in Buffalo, New York. He studied art beginning in 1927 in California at the Otis Art Institute. After...
is an artist I really admire; because he worked so effectively as a painter, print maker and photographer. His images of New Orleans Jazz funerals are really incredible." Blog interview Ratsalad Deluxe 2005.
Work
Greiner's first body of color work, The Reposed, was acquired for the Museum of Modern ArtMuseum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art is an art museum in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It has been important in developing and collecting modernist art, and is often identified as the most influential museum of modern art in the world...
(NYC) permanent collection, by legendary photography curator John Szarkowski
John Szarkowski
John Szarkowski was a photographer, curator, historian, and critic. From 1962 to 1991 Szarkowski was the Director of Photography at New York's Museum of Modern Art.-Early life and career:...
in 1991. The MOMA acquired work was exhibited in a recent acquisitions show at the museum, two years later, in 1993. This work was also published as a monograph by LSU Press in 1999, by the same title. National Public Radio (NPR) Morning Edition, in April 2000, featured an interview with Greiner, conducted by NPR affiliate station KERA, reporter Bill Zeeble.
Other publications include A NEW LIFE: Stories and Photographs from the Suburban South, work about living in the South, was published by W.W. Norton & Company, Visualizing the Blues , Blues Foundation
Blues Foundation
The Blues Foundation is an American nonprofit corporation, headquartered in Memphis, Tennessee, that is affiliated with more than 175 Blues organizations from various parts of the world....
/ Dixon Gallery and Gardens
Dixon Gallery and Gardens
The Dixon Gallery and Gardens is an art museum within 17 acres of gardens, established in 1976, and located at 4339 Park Avenue, Memphis, Tennessee....
2001 and The Story of the South: 1890-2003 , Ogden Museum of Southern Art/Scala Publishers, (September 2003) , and Baton Rouge Blues , University of Alabama at Birmingham
University of Alabama at Birmingham
The University of Alabama at Birmingham is a public university in Birmingham in the U.S. state of Alabama. Developing from an extension center established in 1936, the institution became an autonomous institution in 1969 and is today one of three institutions in the University of Alabama System...
(2006). FALLEN PARADISE (New Orleans 1995-2005), and LAND'S END (Baton Rouge 2007-2010) were published as a limited edition artist books in 2008 and 2010, respectively.
Also published in 2010 and including Greiner's work along with Alex Harris, Edward Burtynsky
Edward Burtynsky
Edward Burtynsky OC is a Canadian photographer and artist who has achieved international recognition for his large-format photographs of industrial landscapes. His work is housed in more than fifteen major museums including the Guggenheim Museum, the National Gallery of Canada, and the Bibliothèque...
and Will Steacy among others, was the title MIGRATION Lost and Found in America. MIGRATION was just chosen as one of the Top Ten Books of the Year by AMERICAN PHOTO—American Photo
Permanent Collections and Exhibitions
Greiners' photographs can be found in over sixty permanent museum collections, including the Ogden Museum of Southern ArtOgden Museum of Southern Art
The Ogden Museum of Southern Art is located in New Orleans, within the Central Business District adjacent to Lee Circle. It is associated with the University of New Orleans...
in New Orleans, The Addison Gallery of American Art
Addison Gallery of American Art
The Addison Gallery of American Art, as a department of Phillips Academy, Andover, Massachusetts, is an academic museum dedicated to collecting American art...
in Andover, Massachusetts, Whitney Museum of American Art
Whitney Museum of American Art
The Whitney Museum of American Art, often referred to simply as "the Whitney", is an art museum with a focus on 20th- and 21st-century American art. Located at 945 Madison Avenue at 75th Street in New York City, the Whitney's permanent collection contains more than 18,000 works in a wide variety of...
and the Museum of Modern Art
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art is an art museum in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It has been important in developing and collecting modernist art, and is often identified as the most influential museum of modern art in the world...
in New York, the Smithsonian American Art Museum
Smithsonian American Art Museum
The Smithsonian American Art Museum is a museum in Washington, D.C. with an extensive collection of American art.Part of the Smithsonian Institution, the museum has a broad variety of American art that covers all regions and art movements found in the United States...
in Washington, D.C, the Art Institute of Chicago
Art Institute of Chicago
The School of the Art Institute of Chicago is one of America's largest accredited independent schools of art and design, located in the Loop in Chicago, Illinois. It is associated with the museum of the same name, and "The Art Institute of Chicago" or "Chicago Art Institute" often refers to either...
in Illinois, the J. Paul Getty Museum
J. Paul Getty Museum
The J. Paul Getty Museum, a program of the J. Paul Getty Trust, is an art museum. It has two locations, one at the Getty Center in Los Angeles, California, and one at the Getty Villa in Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles, California...
and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art is a modern art museum located in San Francisco, California. A nonprofit organization, SFMOMA holds an internationally recognized collection of modern and contemporary art and was the first museum on the West Coast devoted solely to 20th century art...
in California.
In 1993, Greiner's work was exhibited in a two man show with William Eggleston
William Eggleston
William Eggleston , is an American photographer. He is widely credited with increasing recognition for color photography as a legitimate artistic medium to display in art galleries—which, until the 1970s, often tended to privilege work by photographers making black-and-white prints.- Early years...
at the Contemporary Arts Center, New Orleans, LA.
William Eggleston and the Color Tradition, an exhibition exploring the art of American color photography over the last 30 years, was on view at the J. Paul Getty Museum
J. Paul Getty Museum
The J. Paul Getty Museum, a program of the J. Paul Getty Trust, is an art museum. It has two locations, one at the Getty Center in Los Angeles, California, and one at the Getty Villa in Pacific Palisades, Los Angeles, California...
from October 26, 1999 through January 30, 2000. The exhibition included work by : Greiner along with Adam Bartos, Virginia Beahan and Laura McPhee, John Divola
John Divola
John Divola is a contemporary visual artist. He currently lives and works in Los Angeles. Divola works in photography, describing himself as exploring the landscape by looking for the edge between the abstract and the specific....
, Jim Dow, Mitch Epstein
Mitch Epstein
Mitchell "Mitch" Epstein is an American photographer whose photographs are in numerous major museum collections, including New York's Museum of Modern Art and Whitney Museum of American Art, The J. Paul Getty Museum in Los Angeles, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, and the Tate Modern in...
, Rhea Garen, Alex Harris, David Husom, Stephen Johnson, William Larson, and Joel Sternfeld
Joel Sternfeld
Joel Sternfeld, , is a fine-art color photographer noted for his large-format documentary pictures of the United States and helping establish color photography as a respected artistic medium. He has many works in the permanent collections of the MOMA in New York City and the Getty Center in Los...
.
In 2003, Greiner's work was selected to be part of Wait Until Dark along with Lewis Baltz
Lewis Baltz
Lewis Baltz is a visual artist and well known photographer who became an important figure in the New Topographic movement of the late 1970s....
, Todd Hido
Todd Hido
Todd Hido is an American contemporary artist and photographer. Currently based in San Francisco, much of Hido’s work involves urban and suburban housing across the U.S., of which the artist produces large, highly detailed and luminous color photographs."Hido's photographs reveal isolation and...
, David Levinthal
David Levinthal
David Levinthal is a photographer who lives and works in New York.-Biography:David Levinthal received a Scientiæ Magister in Management Science from the MIT Sloan School of Management , an MFA in Photography from Yale University , and a BA in Studio Art from Stanford University...
, Thomas Tulis
Thomas Tulis
Thomas Tulis is an American photographer and painter living and working in Atlanta, Georgia. He was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee.Tulis lives a very simple life....
, Michael Kenna
Michael Kenna
Michael "Hinky Dink" Kenna was one of the two aldermen elected in Chicago's First Ward, from 1897 to 1923.At the age of ten, Kenna left school and began selling newspapers. By the age of twelve, he had borrowed fifty dollars from a bar keeper and purchased a news stand at the corner of Monroe and...
, O. Winston Link
O. Winston Link
Ogle Winston Link , known commonly as O. Winston Link, was an American photographer. He is best known for his black-and-white photography and sound recordings of the last days of steam locomotive railroading on the Norfolk & Western in the United States in the late 1950s...
, Richard Misrach
Richard Misrach
Richard Misrach is an American photographer known for his photographs of human intervention in landscapes. His works are represented in more than fifty major museum collections around the world....
, George Tice
George Tice
George Tice is an American photographer best known for his large-format black-and-white photographs of New Jersey. Tice was born in Newark, New Jersey, and self-trained as a photographer...
and Henry Wessel, Jr.
Henry Wessel, Jr.
Henry Wessel, Jr. is an American photographer noted for his descriptive, yet poetic photographs of the human environment.- Photography career :...
The exhibition took place at The Williams College Museum of Art
Williams College Museum of Art
The Williams College Museum of Art is a teaching museum located in Williamstown, Massachusetts. It is a department of Williams College. The museum's mission is to "advance learning through lively and innovative approaches to art for the students of Williams College and communities beyond the...
, Williamstown, Massachusetts
Williamstown, Massachusetts
Williamstown is a town in Berkshire County, in the northwest corner of Massachusetts. It shares a border with Vermont to the north and New York to the west. It is part of the Pittsfield, Massachusetts Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 7,754 at the 2010 census...
.
Along with William Claxton
William Claxton (photographer)
William Claxton was an American photographer and author.-Biography:Born in Pasadena, California, Claxton's works included a book of photographs of Steve McQueen, and Jazz Life, a book of photographs depicting jazz artists in the 1960s. He was most noted for his photography of jazz musicians...
and Stuart Klipper
Stuart Klipper
'Photographer Stuart Klipper, was born in the Bronx borough of New York City in 1941. He lived in Stockholm, Sweden, but then moved to his current residence in Minneapolis, Minnesota in 1970....
, Greiner participated in a music themed exhibition at the Acadiana Center for the Arts, in Lafayette LA, which ran Jan.- March, 2006.
Greiner participated in the group exhibition, ECONOMY OF SCALE , at Hemphill Fine Arts
Hemphill Fine Arts
Hemphill Fine Arts is an art gallery in Washington, D.C. Founded by George Hemphill in 1993, the gallery quickly assumed an important role in the contemporary art scene of Washington, D.C...
in Washington , D.C., in 2009. The exhibition also included work by William Christenberry
William Christenberry
William Christenberry is a photographer, painter, and sculptor who works with personal and somewhat mythical themes growing out of his childhood experiences in Hale County, Alabama....
, Robert Frank
Robert Frank
Robert Frank , born in Zürich, Switzerland, is an important figure in American photography and film. His most notable work, the 1958 photobook titled The Americans, was influential, and earned Frank comparisons to a modern-day de Tocqueville for his fresh and skeptical outsider's view of American...
, Sebastiao Salgado
Sebastião Salgado
Sebastião Salgado is a Brazilian social documentary photographer and photojournalist.-Biography:Salgado was born on February 8, 1944 in Aimorés, in the state of Minas Gerais, Brazil. After a somewhat itinerant childhood, Salgado initially trained as an economist, earning a master’s degree in...
and David Byrne
David Byrne
David Byrne may refer to:*David Byrne , musician and former Talking Heads frontman**David Byrne , his eponymous album*David Byrne , Irish footballer*David Byrne , English footballer...
.
Also in 2009, Greiner participate in the web based book project, "50 States", along with photographers Lisa Kereszi, Brian Ulrich
Brian Ulrich
Brian Ulrich is an American photographer known for his photographic exploration of consumer culture.Born in Northport, New York, Ulrich lives in Richmond, Virginia....
, Andrew Borowiec and Shawn Records, among others.
Recent solo exhibitions of his work were held at the Louisiana Art & Science Museum in 2008 and the New Orleans Museum of Art
New Orleans Museum of Art
The New Orleans Museum of Art is the oldest fine arts museum in the city of New Orleans. It is situated within City Park, a short distance from the intersection of Carrollton Avenue and Esplanade Avenue, and near the terminus of the "Canal Street - City Park" streetcar line...
in 2010.
Sources
- The Reposed ISBN 0-8071-2413-3
- A New Life ISBN 0-393-04030-5
- MIGRATION Lost and Found in America (2010) ISBN 978-1-932907-82-7
- J. Paul Getty Museum bio
External links
- Official William Greiner web site
- Official William Greiner Blog
- William Greiner bio at Klompching Gallery
- William Greiner bio at the J. Paul Getty Museum
- William Greiner work and bio at Photographs Do Not Bend Gallery
- Luminous-Lint data/biography/images
- William Greiner work in Smithsonian American Art Museum Permanent Collection
- April 12, 2000 NPR interview
- Gambit Article
- http://www.2theadvocate.com/entertainment/arts/26180494.html?commentBody=Thank%20you%20Robin%20for%20writing%20about%20my%20work%20and%20the%20exhibition%20at%20LASM!%20However,%20I%20do%20not%20own%20or%20operate%20a%20frame%20shop,%20all%20the%20frames%20made%20for%20the%20show%20were%20done%20by%20a%20fantastic%20framer%20-%20Frank%20Lamuth%20at%20Four%20Corners%20Gallery%20on%20Highland%20Road%20in%20Baton%20Rouge!%20%20Wm.%20Greiner&name=William%20Greiner&day=Aug%2003,%202008&time=8:58%20AM&reportAbuse=yThe Advocate exhibition review]
- The Cleveland Museum of Art collections inventory
- FRACTION Magazine feature
- AMERICAN SUBURB X feature
- Morris Museum of Art blog reference
- Auction record via ARTNET
- TWO WAY LENS Magazine interview
- AMAZON books
- Ratsalad Deluxe blog interview
- Ogden Museum recent acquisitions show listing.
- DayFour issue 5 - Winter Notes on Summer Impressions (2006)
- DayFour issue 7 - You Can't Always get What You Want (2009)
- HEMPHILL FINE ARTS exhibition listing
- J.Paul Getty Museum exhibition press release
- New Orleans Museum of Art exhibition review 2010