SantanaCopeland
As a child, Santana Copeland ran around the house taking pictures with a camera that had no
film in it. His fascination with images and storytelling led him to Bard College where he received
a BA in Film and Electronic Arts. He made the transition from the moving image to the still image
and earned an MFA in Studio Art from Long Island University Post. He was a panelist at LIMarts’
The Artist’s Vision: Understanding the Creative Inspiration & Process and has exhibited at
Bushwick Community Darkroom, Studio 5404, SIA Gallery, The Steinberg Museum of Art,
and Ripe Art Gallery. He has given artist presentations at Farmingdale State College, Suffolk
County Community College, and Hunter College. Currently, Santana Copeland is a Museum
Educator at the Museum of the Moving Image and a Teaching Artist at BRIC Arts Media.
Despite his age, he continues to be a child that runs around the house.
BlackWhiteColor
There is complexity in something that appears simple; yet at the same time, simple things are easily ignored and discarded.
My attention is drawn towards these overlooked subjects. I am influenced by my immediate surroundings and as my
surroundings change, so does the train of thought. The camera allows me to analyze the differences in the way we interact
with others, the environment, and ourselves. Each body of work starts with a question and I approach the subject as if
shooting a short film. As the work progresses, I arrange the images as if they are songs in an album, both able to stand
on their own as a single unit as well as able to fit together to tell a larger story.
BlackWhiteColor is inspired by Harry Callahan’s Weed Against Sky, Detroit. The silhouette of a skinny plant is backed
by a white sky. There is a sensation of a relaxed day, but any time I look up to the sky I rarely see nature. I see buildings,
communication wires, traffic signs, scaffolds, and all that comes with city living. This project takes the tonal style
of Callahan’s image and collapses it onto the world around me; condensing everyday structures into abstractions.
This is how I make sense of the world. I take it apart, rearrange the pieces, and put them together in a new order. I break
things in order to see how they work and what remains becomes a documentation of my journey for understanding.
Santana Copeland . BlackWhiteColor 4662
. 2015
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