Jennifer Greenburg -- Photographing the Retro Life

I met Jennifer Greenburg several months ago through a mutual friend and later she photographed me in my kitchen with her big film camera (the kind with the hood, so you half expect her to be holding her hand out saying "watch the birdie!). Her work is fascinating to me for obvious reasons. Her main subject, for her series The Rockabillies, is people who recreate -- often quite meticulously -- mid-century environments in their homes and lives.

A segment about her on the Museum of Contemporary Photography website states: "Her large-scale color photographs show not only the 1950s clothing and décor favored in rockabilly culture, but also the activities and values her subjects have adopted in accordance with that era. While their revival of a mid-20 th century middle-class lifestyle is meticulous, it is equally selective, borrowing from a particular vision of American life rather than seeking to recreate its realities. A subtly selective focus in these pictures draws attention to particular details in each scene, a cue that the photographer is interpreting and not just recording the places and poses before her."

I, for one, can't wait for a book of her collected works. You can see more of her work here and there are a few of her prints for sale at DVA gallery.