Portrait nominee

For The Glass transforms the flatbed scanner into a contemporary version of the
photographic plate. Meditating on the tradition of portraiture, each image mimics the
sharp details and imperfections in the surfaces of 19th-century studio portraits. I use
digital equipment to return to this slow pace of production by scanning over the subjects
as they sit for extended exposures. These portraits capture every movement, which in
turn creates unique digital images that cannot be replicated. The relationship between
my subjects and myself becomes a performative act of photographing. With the
inclusion of my own self portrait in the series, my focus is on the intimacy of the work’s
process and my investigations on how one is to interact with the reinvented plate. This
series invites the viewer to become immersed in the surface of the image as it magnifies
my relationship to the process and an uneasy relationship with technology.

Suzette Bross is a photographer who has exhibited her works nationally and
internationally. Her work is part of permanent collections with The Art Institute of
Chicago, The New Britain Museum of American Art, The Cleveland Museum of
Art, Museum of Contemporary Photography, and The Mary & Leigh Block
Museum of Art. Bross has exhibited with The Cape Cod Museum of Art in
Dennis, MA, Geary Contemporary in New York, EXPO Chicago, Chicago Artists
Coalition and more. She was part of the inaugural group exhibition for Chicago
Google Artist Initiative. Bross lives and works in Chicago, Illinois where she is
the Founder and Executive Director of the non-profit arts organization, CPS
Lives.