Senior Lecturer in Photography
I am an artist, photographer, and Senior Lecturer in Photography. I work with analogue and digital photography, eco-printing, moving image, creative writing, and archives. I have exhibited my work both nationally and internationally, including exhibitions at Street Level Photoworks Gallery, Glasgow, Impressions Gallery, Bradford, and The Palacio des Artes, Porto.
My publications include ‘Villa Mona – A Proper Kind of House’ Trace Editions, 2006, ‘Field Study 7 Residence Astral’ PARC, 2009 and 'Growing Up in the New Age', Daylight NYC, 2013.
In 2020 my work was shown at Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art in a mid-career retrospective exhibition 'This is What I See'. Using photography, creative text, and archival materials I explored a range of themes linking autobiography to wider political issues.
I am currently undertaking a practice-based PhD funded by Northern Bridge Doctoral Training Partnership (AHRC) Time, Image, Archive: Visualising gardening communities through auto-ethnographic photographic practice.
Teaching and supervision
Research interests for potential research students
- Photography and autobiography/auto-ethnography
- Photography and the family
- Photography and the counterculture
- Photography and sustainability/ ecology
- Photography and invisible illness/loss
Research
My practice uses photography, plants, creative writing, and archival materials to explore a range of themes and issues that look at linking personal experiences to broader social and political narratives. These include family, memory, counterculture, gardening/women/politics, and more than human worlds. My work moves between the personal album and the social document.
'This is What I See' was a solo exhibition held at Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art in 2019. Bringing together 20 years of my practice, this show included a number of bodies of work exploring themes of family, history, memory, counterculture, the garden, invisible illness, and the use of autobiography as an artistic methodology. A new publication will accompany this exhibition.
Previous projects:
A Gardener’s Daughter explores the relationship between art, gardening, and wellbeing through a practice-based research methodology. Through this project, I am exploring themes such as ‘Women and Gardens’, ‘Radical Gardening’, and ‘Politics of Gardening’. I am also exploring these themes through Doctoral Research as a Northern Bridge Doctoral Training Partnership-funded student based in Fine Art at Newcastle University.
Growing up in the New Age explored the counterculture of the 1960s and 70s considering the utopian ideals and problematic areas of the darker side to the 'New Age'. It also asked what we might learn from them today.
The Last Picture Show: In 2006 I received a Research Development Fellowship to undertake 'The Last Picture Show', a project looking at the changing nature of family photography in the digital age. This fellowship was a collaboration with Professor Val Williams at ‘The Photography and the Archive Research Centre' (PARC) and led to outputs including a Field Study publication 'Residence Astral'.
Publications
Article
Ryley, Marjolaine (2022) The Mushroom Who Saw the Future. Mycologies - Antennae The Journal of Nature in Visual Culture, 58 (58). pp. 179-191.
Ryley, Marjolaine (2012) One Photograph - Life on the Floor. Photography & Culture. ISSN 978-0857852724; 1751-4517
Ryley, Marjolaine (2008) Residence Astral. Portfolio magazine - issue No. 47 (47). ISSN 13544446
Book Section
Ryley, Marjolaine (2022) A Guide to Eco-Printing in 'ReSource'. In: ReSource. Sustainable Darkroom.
Reports, briefing/ working papers
Ryley, Marjolaine (2014) The Thin Blue Line, The Deep Red Sea. Other. NEPN, UK.
Book
Ryley, Marjolaine (2013) 'Growing up in the New Age' - Artists Monograph. Daylight Imprint, New York USA. ISBN 9780983231684
Ryley, Marjolaine and Ryley, Brigette (2006) Fieldstudy 7. University of Sunderland.
Ryley, Marjolaine, Brown, Camilla and Ryley, Brigette (2006) Villa Mona - a proper kind of house. TRACE Editions. ISBN 0955094526
Show/Exhibition
Ryley, Marjolaine (2022) A Tendril of Creeper as part of 'A Rose is a Rose is a Rose' exhibition. https://www.hestercombe.com/whats-on/artists-discussion-a-rose-is-a-rose, , Hestercombe Gsllery.
Ryley, Marjolaine (2020) 'This is What I See' Mid Career Retrospective at Northern Gallery for Contemporary Art. https://sunderlandculture.org.uk/events/marjolaine-ryley-this-is-what-i-see/, .
Ryley, Marjolaine (2012) Growing up in the New Age (2012). Growing up in the New Age, April - September 2012, Glasgow and Wolverhampton UK.
Ryley, Marjolaine (2010) The Guru and Earth Changes. Photographic works exploring a personal history. Like Tears in Rain, 11 Jun - 28 Jul 2010, Palácio das Artes – Fábrica de Talentos, Porto, Portugal.
Ryley, Marjolaine (2009) Residence Astral. Apr 2009, Victoria & Albert Museum - Photography gallery, room 38a.
Ryley, Marjolaine (2009) Photo 50 - 2009. , London Art Fair, Islington.
Video
Ryley, Marjolaine (2012) The Thin Blue Line/ The Deep Red Sea. [Video] (Unpublished)
Other
Ryley, Marjolaine (2008) Jackson, tina - Review of Residence Astral. UNSPECIFIED.
Ryley, Marjolaine (2008) Clark, Robert Review of 'Residence Astral'. UNSPECIFIED.
Ryley, Marjolaine (2008) Review of 'Residence Astral'. Independent newspaper.
- Photography and archival practice
- Photography and autobiography
- Photography and ecology
- Photography and the counterculture
My work can be viewed at
