Betty Press
Betty Press is a fine art and documentary photographer whose career spans more than 25 years. Her photographic career started when she moved to Africa in 1987 where she established connections with UNICEF, UNHCR, and other non profit organizations. With Press’ most recent photo project, Finding Mississippi, she intentionally photographs her adoptive home state using old and/or inexpensive analog cameras to achieve imperfections on the film negative, which, she says, serve as metaphors for “how landscape, race, and religion have played a part in the complicated history of Mississippi and still affect lives today.”
Her photographs have been widely exhibited and collected around the world. Press has been honored with a number of awards, including two visual Artist Fellowship Grants from the Mississippi Arts Commission, Best of Show at the Cotton District Festival Art Exhibition (Starkville, MS), and a handful of Juror’s Choice awards. In 2011 she published her first photobook, I Am Because We Are: African Wisdom in Image and Proverb, and has since released another photobook and a zine. Press’ photographs have been featured in Shots Magazine, Southern Glossary, Lenscratch magazine, Oxford American, Aint-Bad Magazine, and more.