PROJECT:  Catching Shadows

Tintype Portraits and Recorded Voices of Native Americans Living in the   21st century on Maryland's Eastern Shore.

 19th Century Native Americans called the white men with large cameras "Shadow Catchers".

This body of work has been a traveling exhibition, which opened in April 2010.

In contrast to some of the better-known North American tribes of today, these Native Americans have pursued fairly obscure lives on what was a relatively isolated peninsula until the mid-Twentieth Century.

Although not recognized by the Federal or State governments, the Maryland Commission on Indian Affairs does acknowledge the four tribal groups: the  Accohannock, Assateague, Nause Waiwash Band of Indians, and the Pocomoke. The premise of the project was to let the Indians stand and speak for themselves. Their recorded voices accompany their portraits.

 All the images were made from wet-plate collodion tintypes, in the manner first described by Frederick Scott Archer in the year 1851. I used a wooden reproduction camera and a brass, Voigtlander Petzval lens made in 1864.

Catching Shadows received support from

The Maryland State Arts Council,

The Maryland Humanities Council

PNC Bank, The Chaney Foundation

It is archived at

The Nabb Center, University of Maryland, Salisbury

The Ward Museum, Salisbury, Maryland