Tim Long

(b.1951; resides Chicago, IL)

Havana #47, 2005

Havana #12, 2005

Havana #44, 2005

A heartbreakingly beautiful city and plain heartbreaking in its decrepitude, Havana reads like a map of Cuban history. – T. S. Long

From the art deco style hotels supported by American gambling and tourism in the1930s and 1940s, to the Soviet style public housing of the 1970s and 1980s, Cuba’s architecture charts decades of political change. Shot in the fall of 2005, Tim Long’s Havana pictures document the mix and range of architecture in the country’s capital without losing sight of the people who work and live in these buildings. Set against crumbling facades and fading paint, the activity of pedestrians and old cars demonstrate the city’s life, often captured in a blur of motion. The contrast of what was and what is, of reality and possibility, is also suggested visually through scenes generally dominated by dark shadows but always set off by small edges or distant streets bright with sunlight.

Work from Tim Long’s previous MPP portfolio is due to be published in 2007 by the Center for American Places as the monograph River Camp. His work is also included in the collections of the Mary and Leigh Block Museum, Tweed Museum of Art, and Frank Lloyd Wright Preservation Trust. He is the Director of the Portfolio Center at Columbia College Chicago.

- Kendra Greene

PAST PORTFOLIOS

Illinois Turner Camp, 2004

Illinois Turner Camp, 2004

Illinois Turner Camp, 2003

The sense of quiet decorum that dominates many housing developments is cheerfully absent here… The overall effect is like a tidy sub-division put through a blender. - Tim Long, 2005

Tim Long first noticed the Illinois Turner Camp while kayaking the Fox River in the 1990s, and then spent 2003 to 2005 photographing its collection of small houses. Though built largely according to the same design, the houses have been customized by their owners through choices in paint color, additional construction, and a personal array of possessions stored outside. Long’s pictures delight in their vivid colors and simple geometry, usually bathed in the warmth of fading light.

A recipient of a 2003 Illinois Arts Council Fellowship, Long earned his BA from Columbia College Chicago (1980) and his MFA from University of Illinois at Chicago (1983). His photographs have been part of exhibitions such as Chicago in the Year 2000 at the Chicago Cultural Center, Landmark Buildings at the Landmark Preservation Council of Illinois, and Midwest Photographers at the Museum of Contemporary Photography. Work from Tim Long’s previous MPP portfolio is due to be published in 2007 by the Center for American Places as the monograph River Camp. His work is also included in the collections of the Mary and Leigh Block Museum, Tweed Museum of Art, and Frank Lloyd Wright Preservation Trust. He is the Director of the Portfolio Center at Columbia College Chicago.

Untitled, 1999

In the Great Plains series, Tim Long documents the landscape of Nebraska and South Dakota with a keen sense of the area’s history. Begun in 1999, this on-going project is mindful of the long-standing influence of Native American tribes in the region, the last two centuries of American settlement and western expansion, and the current impact of agriculture on the Plains’ distinctive vistas. Weathered structures suggest both age and fragility, while the photographs are printed in warm dark tones at once ominous and nostalgic.