Artist Statement
At a certain age you realize that you are, in large part, what you do. I do not remember when I took my first photograph, but I remember getting my first “serious” camera in 1969. Now, after 35 years of translating the ideas of others into photographs, I use photography to learn more about how I see and think photographically.
My name is Rick Ashley. Born and raised in Baltimore, MD, I now reside in Marblehead, MA with my wife, a large black dog, and occasionally one of our two daughters. I grew up in an automobile dealership, studied latin for six years in high school, graduated from Trinity College (a non-sectarian school) with a degree in Religion, and was predictably unemployable. After a year and a half of the New England School of Photography’s two year certification program I began working in Boston’s commercial photography studios. Two years later I set out on my own.
Past clients include: IBM, Xerox Canada, Coors Beer, Raleigh Bicycles, Franklin Sporting Goods, Sperry, Dunkin Donuts and Eastpak.
Proudest (professional) moment: winning the New York Art Directors Gold Pencil for the first AIDS public service TV spot; done for the local AIDS Action Committee, the spot went national and was shown at the 1988 Super Bowl.
In 2003 the studio and all its contents were consumed by fire. In 2004 I moved to Rome with my youngest daughter and six months later returned to teach, eventually becoming a director of the photography program at Boston University’s Center for Digital Imaging Arts. In 2011 I left the school in a taxi. If I couldn’t have found a taxi, I would have left in a huff or if that was too soon, a minute and a huff.
Now I work with photography for its own intrinsic value. My last series of photographs, “Michael”, received a fellowship grant from the Massachusetts Cultural Council, was included in the New England Photography Biennial, Flash Forward Boston, and juried into Review SantaFe, and shown in part at The Danforth Museum, Panopticon Gallery, the New Art Center, and Photographic Resource Center.
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