Episode 130: Lois Conner

Dear Listener,

I’m delighted to finally release episode 130 of Commonplace, featuring photographer Lois Conner. I recorded this conversation in Lois’s apartment in New York City near Gramercy Park in December of 2023. 

Lois had emailed a few days earlier to ask if I would collaborate with her and write something to accompany a new photography book she was planning to release, one featuring photographs of pregnant women. I said yes—of course!—and asked if we could also record a conversation for Commonplace. 

Lois is one of my favorite professors from my time at Yale, and it was an honor and a joy to get to spend over four hours with her. I got to hear the story of her life and career, talk about photography, look at prints of the photographs that were about to become a book, and to catch up with someone who has been profoundly influential to me and my creative work and my teaching. I think this episode will be a real treat for anyone interested in photography, but I don’t think you don’t need to know the photographers we’re talking about, or anything about the history of photography in order to enjoy this conversation about life and art.

I also want to recommend episode 7—”The Slippage between Image and Subject”—of Hey, It’s Me, in which Mike Sakasagawa and I discuss this episode! (I sent an earlier version of this episode to Mike and asked him for feedback as a photographer, podcaster, and my friend.) It’s very meta—a podcast episode about a podcast episode—and some of you might really love it.

The New York-based photographer Lois Conner has been traveling the world with a 7x17” banquet camera for nearly half a century. Through the elongated format of her work she has explored the landscape and the temper of our times; her art is both contemporary and, due to her vision, ‘a long view’ that captures the eternal in the moment, timeless. Conner’s work is that of the artist-artisan: every aspect of her art involves the hand made combined with demanding techniques of platinum printing. In recent years she has employed digital technologies to expand the format of her work, embracing landscapes from the natural to the man-made. Her annual trips to China since 1984 have allowed her to follow the transformation of the People’s Republic and to share her unique understanding of the country’s changing urban and rural mien, as well as the vistas that inspired the country’s unique culture.

Conner has been based in New York City since 1971, where she worked for the United Nations until 1984. During that time she was awarded a Bachelor in Fine Arts (photography) from the Pratt Institute and a Master’s degree from Yale University. Conner has also taught photography at many places, including over a decade as professor of photography at Yale University.

The second cycle of Reading with Rachel started this October (we read Helen DeWitt’s The English Understand Wool) and will run through July. Sarah Manguso will be our guest in November—we’re reading Liars. You can sign up for Reading with Rachel here.

Here are a few photographs from my incredible day with Lois, back in December.

May this conversation and this podcast be of benefit to all beings, and may you be well. Thank you for listening.

Warmly,

Rachel