Jeanette May

Still Life with Spy Camera continues the exploration of beautifully designed vintage technology begun in my Tech Vanitas series. Surrounded by rich silks and damask wall covering, arrangements of domestic technology once again suggest 17th Century Dutch vanitas still life paintings. My photographs display a reverence for finely crafted merchandise, industrial design, and scientific wonders. The devices span vintage clocks and landline phones to electronic adaptors. Each object’s style, color, and material construction epitomize a period of both aesthetic and technological advancement. What becomes of the beloved tech that stops working or can’t be updated? My still lifes examine the present and the past of technology without easy answers but rather, like the Dutch vanitas, with a sense of wonder and trepidation.

Jeanette May is a photo-based artist using a critical, sometimes playful, approach to investigate representation. Early training as a painter is evident in her carefully arranged compositions and rich color palette. May’s photographs are constructed, staged, lit, and carefully considered. Her recent still life projects embrace technology, design, and obsolescence. May received her MFA in Photography from CalArts and her BFA in Painting from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. She has been awarded grants, fellowships, and residencies from the NEA Regional Artists’ Projects Fund, Brooklyn Arts Council, New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, Illinois Arts Council, Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs, Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, and Ms. Foundation. Her work is exhibited in galleries and museums internationally, including New York City, Washington, DC, Chicago, Los Angeles, Toronto, Milan, Athens, Barcelona, and Shanghai. May lives in Brooklyn, NY.