Lori Nix (born 1969) is an American photographer known for her photographs of handmade

dioramas A diorama is a replica of a scene, typically a three-dimensional full-size or miniature model, sometimes enclosed in a glass showcase for a museum. Dioramas are often built by hobbyists as part of related hobbies such as military vehicle mode ...

Early life

Lori Nix was born in

Norton, Kansas Norton is a city in, and the county seat of, Norton County, Kansas, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population of the city was 2,747. History Norton was founded in 1872. Like the county, it was named for Capt. Orloff Norton. The f ...

in 1969. She graduated from

Truman State University Truman State University (TSU or Truman) is a public university in Kirksville, Missouri. It had 4,225 enrolled students in the fall of 2021 pursuing degrees in 52 undergraduate and 11 graduate programs. The university is named for U.S. Presiden ...

in 1993. She went on to study photography at the graduate level at

Ohio University Ohio University is a Public university, public research university in Athens, Ohio. The first university chartered by an Act of Congress and the first to be chartered in Ohio, the university was chartered in 1787 by the Congress of the Confeder ...

, and moved to

Brooklyn, New York Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...

in 1999, where she has lived and worked for almost 20 years.

Artistic practice

Nix considers herself a "faux landscape photographer", and her work is influenced by

extreme weather Extreme weather or extreme climate events includes unexpected, unusual, severe, or unseasonal weather; weather at the extremes of the historical distribution—the range that has been seen in the past. Often, extreme events are based on a locat ...

and

disaster films A disaster film or disaster movie is a film genre that has an impending or ongoing disaster as its subject and primary plot device. Such disasters may include natural disasters, accidents, military/terrorist attacks or global catastrophes such a ...

. She works without digital manipulation, using miniatures and models to create surreal scenes and landscapes, building dioramas that range from 20 inches to six feet in diameter. They take several months to build, and two to three weeks to photograph. For many years Nix used a

large format Large format refers to any imaging format of or larger. Large format is larger than "medium format", the or size of Hasselblad, Mamiya, Rollei, Kowa, and Pentax cameras (using 120- and 220-roll film), and much larger than the frame o ...

8 × 10 film camera but in 2015 she started photographing her dioramas with a digital camera. Nix works with Kathleen Gerber, a trained glass artist, constructing most of the scenery by hand from scratch, using "foam and glue and paint and anything else handy." After the final photograph is made, Nix harvests the diorama for pieces for future use and then destroys it.

Major projects

Photography

*''Empire'', 2015–2018. This series is primarily concerned with the exterior spaces of urban structures and landscapes. The detailed photographs show the case of a modern empire after an inexplicable catastrophe: deserted places and half-decayed architectures that are slowly being recaptured by flora and fauna. *''The City'', 2005–2013. A

post-apocalyptic Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction is a subgenre of speculative fiction in which the Earth's (or another planet's) civilization is collapsing or has collapsed. The apocalypse event may be climatic, such as runaway climate change; astro ...

vision wherein Nix explores what it would be like to be one of the last remaining people living in a city, imagining indoor urban scenes. *''Lost'', 2003–2004. Nix "subverts the traditions of

landscape photography Landscape photography shows the spaces within the world, sometimes vast and unending, but other times microscopic. Landscape photographs typically capture the presence of nature but can also focus on man-made features or disturbances of landscapes ...

to create her own humorously dark world", examining feelings of isolation and loneliness. *''Some Other Place'', 2000–2002. Made after Nix moved to New York in 1999, featured neighborhood sidewalks, city parks, and forays into the wilderness. *''Unnatural History'', 2009. A series of tiny dioramas of rooms in imaginary museums, partly inspired by New York's

American Museum of Natural History The American Museum of Natural History (abbreviated as AMNH) is a natural history museum on the Upper West Side of Manhattan in New York City. In Theodore Roosevelt Park, across the street from Central Park, the museum complex comprises 26 inter ...

. *''Accidentally Kansas'', 1998–2000. Tornadoes, floods, insect infestations, and other bizarre events that featured during her childhood in the

American Midwest The Midwestern United States, also referred to as the Midwest or the American Midwest, is one of four census regions of the United States Census Bureau (also known as "Region 2"). It occupies the northern central part of the United States. I ...

Video

*''A City Severed'', 2012. A short film that recreates the 1863

New York City draft riots The New York City draft riots (July 13–16, 1863), sometimes referred to as the Manhattan draft riots and known at the time as Draft Week, were violent disturbances in Lower Manhattan, widely regarded as the culmination of white working-cla ...

in miniature, produced with Four Story Treehouse. *''The Story of Sushi'', 2012. A short film about

sustainable Specific definitions of sustainability are difficult to agree on and have varied in the literature and over time. The concept of sustainability can be used to guide decisions at the global, national, and individual levels (e.g. sustainable livin ...

sushi in miniature, produced with Four Story Treehouse.

Publications

*''Contact Sheet 117: The Light Work Annual''. Light Work, 2002. *''Contact Sheet 119 Lori Nix: Waiting to Happen, Light Work''. Light Work, 2002 *''Lori Nix: The City''. Decode Books, 2013. With an essay by Barbara Pollack. *''Lori Nix. The Power of Nature''. Wienand, 2015. .

Solo exhibitions

*2018: ''Empire'', Galerie Klüser. *2017: ''Empire'', ClampArt. *2016: ''Lori Nix: The City'',

Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art The Nerman Museum of Contemporary Art is an art museum that is part of Johnson County Community College in Overland Park, Kansas. The Nerman Museum is named for donors Jerry and Margaret Nerman. It opened in October 2007, succeeding the college's ...

, Kansas. *2016: ''Lost'', Galerie Klüser, Munich. *2015: ''The Power of Nature'', Museum Schloss Moyland, Bedburg-Hau. *2015: ''Imagined Worlds, Large and Small'', Hillstrom Museum of Art,

Gustavus Adolphus College Gustavus Adolphus College ( ) is a private liberal arts college in St. Peter, Minnesota. It was founded in 1862 by Swedish Americans led by Eric Norelius and is affiliated with the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. Gustavus gets its nam ...

. *2014: ''The City'', Galerie Klüser. *2013: ''The City'', G. Gibson Gallery. *2013: ''More Photographs From The City'', ClampArt. *2013: ''Unnatural History'',

Drexel University Drexel University is a private research university with its main campus in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Drexel's undergraduate school was founded in 1891 by Anthony J. Drexel, a financier and philanthropist. Founded as Drexel Institute of Art, S ...

's Art of Science Gallery. *2012: ''The City'', Bau-Xi Gallery, West Toronto, ON, Canada. *2012: ''The City'', Museum of Art,

University of Maine The University of Maine (UMaine or UMO) is a Public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Orono, Maine. It was established in 1865 as the land-grant college of Maine and is the Flagship universities, flagshi ...

, Bangor, Maine. *2012: ''The City'', Hamilton Gallery,

Salve Regina University Salve Regina University is a private Roman Catholic university in Newport, Rhode Island, United States. It was founded in 1934 by the Sisters of Mercy and is accredited by the New England Commission of Higher Education. The university enrolls mo ...

, Newport, Rhode Island. *2011: ''Unnatural History'' and ''The City'', CEPA Gallery, Rochester, New York. *2011: ''The City'', Catherine Edelman Gallery. *2011: ''The City'', Flippo Gallery, Randolph-Macon College, Ashland, Virginia. *2010: ''The City'', ClampArt.

Collections

Smithsonian American Art Museum The Smithsonian American Art Museum (commonly known as SAAM, and formerly the National Museum of American Art) is a museum in Washington, D.C., part of the Smithsonian Institution. Together with its branch museum, the Renwick Gallery, SAAM holds o ...

, Washington, DC. * Museum of Fine Arts,

Houston Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 in ...

, Texas. *

George Eastman House The George Eastman Museum, also referred to as ''George Eastman House, International Museum of Photography and Film'', the world's oldest museum dedicated to photography and one of the world's oldest film archives, opened to the public in 1949 in ...

Rochester, New York Rochester () is a City (New York), city in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York, the county seat, seat of Monroe County, New York, Monroe County, and the fourth-most populous in the state after New York City, Buffalo, New York, Buffalo, ...

. *

Spencer Museum of Art The Spencer Museum of Art is an art museum operated by the University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas. Accredited by the American Alliance of Museums, the Spencer Museum seeks to "...present its collection as a living archive that motivates object-c ...

University of Kansas The University of Kansas (KU) is a public research university with its main campus in Lawrence, Kansas, United States, and several satellite campuses, research and educational centers, medical centers, and classes across the state of Kansas. Tw ...

Lawrence, Kansas Lawrence is the county seat of Douglas County, Kansas, Douglas County, Kansas, United States, and the sixth-largest city in the state. It is in the northeastern sector of the state, astride Interstate 70, between the Kansas River, Kansas and Waka ...

Awards

*2014:

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

in the US & Canada Competition for Creative Arts Photography.Guggenheim Foundation

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Nix, Lori American women photographers Truman State University alumni Ohio University alumni People from Norton, Kansas Living people 1969 births 21st-century American women