Education
2001 MFA, San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, CA
1995 BA, Anthropology; Minor, Studio Art, Guilford College, Greensboro, NC
1997 Resident Certificate Program, Maine Photographic Workshops, Rockport, ME
Teaching Experience
2017 Assistant Professor, University of North Carolina at Greensboro
2014-2017 Visiting Assistant Professor, University of North Carolina at Greensboro
2006-2014 Lecturer in photography, University of North Carolina at Greensboro
2006-2014 Center for Documentary Studies, Duke University, Durham, NC
2003 Maine Photographic Workshops, Rockport, ME
Durham Arts Council, Durham, NC
2002 Maine Photographic Workshops, Rockport, ME
2001 San Francisco Art Institute, San Francisco, CA
Books
Collections, Leah Sobsey. Daylight Books, 2016, 128-page monograph of photographs and installations created from specimens from the collections of the US National Park Service museums, North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences, and North Carolina State University Insect Museum
Bull City Summer, Daylight Books, 2014, Collaborative photography and writing project documenting a season at the Durham Bulls Athletic Park. Artists include: Alex Harris, Frank Hunter, Kate Joyce, Elizabeth Matheson, Alec Soth, Hiroshi Watanabe, Jeff Whetstone, and Hank Willis Thomas
Exhibitions Solo and Two Persons
*Denotes solo show
2018 *Center For Fine Art Photography, Fort Collins, CO Curated by Hamidah Glasgow
Block2 an outdoor public video venue in Raleigh, NC
2017 *Tintypes A Community Portrait, Anchorlight, Raleigh, NC
The photography Show, AIPAD, New York, NY
2016 *Collections, 21c Museum Hotel, Durham, NC
Collections, Rayko Photo Gallery, San Francisco, CA
The Accidental Self, Carrack Modern Art, Durham, NC
2015 Visual History Collaborative Tapestry, Denver Performing Arts Center, Denver, CO
2013-2011 Rose Community Foundation, Denver, CO
2012 *Horace Williams Gallery, Chapel Hill NC
2010-2009
Chapel Hill Community Art Project, collaboration with Lynn Bregman Blass, Town of Chapel Hill, one- year traveling public art installation: stops include Chapel Hill Museum, University Mall, Carrboro High School, and Carrboro Arts Center
2008 Time, Lineage, Memory, collaboration with Lynn Bregman Blass, Durham Art Guild, Durham, NC
*Appropriations, Benjamin Gallery, Graham, NC
2007 *Photograms, Points of View Gallery, Raleigh, NC
*The In Between Series Continued, Wee Gallery, Carrboro, NC
Phase Two, Gathering in the Stories: One Man’s Impact on the Members of the Duke University Health System Community, part of the 19th Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Commemoration, Duke Hospital, Durham, North Carolina
2006 *The In Between Series Continued: Here Is Now and Now Is Here, Padgett Station Gallery, Carrboro, NC
*The In Between Series, Nested, Carrboro, NC
Gathering in the Stories: One Man’s Impact on Members of the Duke University Health System
Community, part of the 17th Annual Martin Luther King Jr. Commemoration, Permanent installation, Duke University Hospital, Durham, NC
2005 *The Goode Collection, Duke University Hospital, Durham, NC
2004 *Fallen, Nested Gallery, Carrboro, NC
*The Goode Collection, Duke Hospital, Durham, NC
2003 The Goode Collection, Horace Williams House, Chapel Hill, NC
2002 *Housing a Home, Series 1Studio, Carrboro, NC
*Running with Trains, Lee Moore Gallery, Carrboro, NC
*New Works, Sizl Gallery, Carrboro, NC
2001 *New Works, Stillights Gallery, San Francisco, CA
2000 *Incision, Stillights Gallery, San Francisco, CA
Selected Group Exhibitions
2018 Bloc2, The Wild, Raleigh NC Curated by Stacy Bloom Rexrode
Moss Arts Center, Virginia Tech, VA
2017 The Portrait, Praxis Gallery, Minneapolis, MN, Juror Ross Anderson
Faculty Biennial, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro, NC
The Fence Project, Public Art Installation, Durham North Carolina
2016 Collections, Rayko Photo, San Francisco, CA
Actual Size, Cassilhaus Gallery, Chapel Hill, NC
2015 The Modernists, Lee Hansley Gallery, Raleigh, NC
Faculty Biennial, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro, NC
The Scanners, Carrack Modern Art, Durham, NC
The Committee, Horace Williams Gallery, Chapel Hill, NC
Butterflies Are Free, Light Art Design, Chapel Hill, NC
Self Portraits by NC Artists, Greenhill Gallery, Greensboro, NC
2014 Bull City Summer, NC Museum Of Art, Raleigh, NC
Bull City Summer, Contemporary Art Museum, Raleigh NC
Spirit, Brink Gallery, Missoula, Montana
Art on Paper, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Curator Xandra Eden, Greensboro, NC,
Engaging Light, Frank Gallery, Chapel Hill, NC
2013 Faculty Biennial, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro, NC
The Residents, Gatewood Gallery, Greensboro, NC
2012 Through Your Eyes, National Parks System Gallery, digital gallery online
2011 No Mirrors, Rayko Gallery, San Francisco, CA
North Carolina Museum of Art, Art of the Auction, Raleigh, NC
Local Histories, the Ground We Walk On, 523 East Franklin, Chapel Hill, NC
Art on Paper, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro, NC
2010 North Carolina Artists Exhibition, Betty Ray McCain Gallery, Progress Energy Center for the Performing Arts, Raleigh, NC
Flora, Photo Place Gallery, Middlebury, VT
2009 Faculty Biennial, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Greensboro, NC
Celebrating Creative Teaching, African American Atelier Greensboro, NC
2008 Regrowth, Greenhill Center for North Carolina Art, Curator Edie Carpenter, Greensboro, NC
Art on Paper, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Curator Xandra Eden, Greensboro, NC
Faculty Show, Weaver Cooke, Greensboro, NC
Photographic Memories, Gallery 115, Wachovia Tower, Greensboro, NC
2007 UNCG Department of Art Faculty Biennial, Greensboro, NC
Portraits, Points of View Gallery, Raleigh, NC
2006 Art on Paper, Weatherspoon Art Museum, Curator Xandra Eden, Greensboro, NC
Never Exhibited Works, Visual Art Exchange, Raleigh, NC
Celebrating Creative Teaching, Greensboro Cultural Center, Greensboro, NC
New Faculty Show, Elliot Center Gallery, Greensboro, NC
Alternative Process Show, Curator Christopher James, Soho Photo Gallery, NYC, NY
Hot & Now, Gallery 115, Greensboro, NC
2005 From the Hive, Weatherspoon Museum, Greensboro, NC
Student Action Farm Workers Benefit Auction,
The Center for Documentary Studies, Durham, NC
New Works, Faculty Exhibit, Gallery 115, Greensboro, NC
Art on Paper, Weatherspoon Museum, Greensboro, NCR
2004 Loom 3: Labeler, Pittsboro, NC
Group Show, Red Hat, Raleigh, NC
Through Women’s Eyes, by Women’s Hands, Chapel Hill, NC
2003 Fresh Picks, UNCG Faculty Biennial, Weatherspoon Museum, Greensboro, NC
Mirror with a Memory, CCB Gallery, Durham, NC
2002 Faculty Show, Maine Photographic Workshops, Rockport, ME
Group Show, Sandspur Gallery, Raleigh, NC
All About Eve, Green Tara Gallery, Chapel Hill, NC
2001 Mirror with a Memory, Fort Mason, San Francisco, CA
Group Show, Microsoft headquarters, San Francisco, CA
2000 Group Show, Fairfield Visual Arts Center, Fairfield, CA
Group Show, Diego Rivera Gallery, San Francisco, CA
1997 Group Show, Gallery One, Rockport, ME Press
Collaborations
2018 Double Crossed, a multidisciplinary performance piece.
Thoreau’s Woods: Meditations on Life and Loss, an interdisciplinary multimedia art installation using digitized animations of Thoreau’s pressed plant specimens, housed at Harvard University’s Herbaria, to explore the beauty of the natural world Thoreau documented as well as the decline.
2017 *Click! Photography Festival PIC grant award with Tim Telkamp, created tintypes in a mobile unit to bring community together.
*Walden Collection, with Emily Meineke, Harvard researcher, Marsha Gordon, film-maker, Robin Vuchnich, graphic designer
2016 The Accidental Self, with Linda Belans, Carrack Modern Art, 2016
2014 Bull City Summer: A Season at the Park, with artists Alex Harris, Frank Hunter, Kate Joyce, Elizabeth
Matheson, Alec Soth, Hiroshi Watanabe, Jeff Whetstone, and Hank Willis Thomas
2011-present
Visual History Collaborative, with Lynn Bregman Blass
2013 Professor Diablo’s True Revue, a documentary production with biologist Courtney Fitzpatrick and
musician Melissa Swingle, Casbah, Durham, NC
2006 Gathering in the Stories: One Man’s Impact on the Members of the Duke University Health System
Community as part of the Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration, Duke Hospital, Durham, NC
Commissions/Public Art
2011-16 Rose Community Foundation, Visual History Project, with Lynn Bregman Blass, Denver, CO
Habitat for Humanity Durham 25th anniversary, with Lynn Bregman Blass
2013-14 Bull City Summer, Durham, NC
2009 Chapel Hill Public Arts Commission, with Lynn Bregman Blass, Chapel Hill, NC
2008 Chapel Hill Public Arts Commission, with Lynn Bregman Blass, Chapel Hill, NC
2006 Gathering in the Stories: One Man’s Impact on the Members of the Duke University Health System
Community as part of the Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration, Duke Hospital, Durham, NC
Workshops
North Carolina Museum of Art, Teacher Workshop, Art as Advocacy, Cyanotype workshop for North Carolina educators, in conjunction with the Ansel Adams exhibition.
North Carolina Museum of Art, Alchemy and Cyanotype workshop for college students.
Wet Plate Collodion Workshop, Chapel Hill, NC
Hirsch Wellness, a cancer support community workshop: Memories, Objects and
Images, Cyanotype text and image workshop, Greensboro, NC
Habla, The Center For Language and Culture, Teaching Artist Residency and
Workshop, Cyanotype text and image workshop, Merida, Mexico
International Press
Telegraph, July 14, 2016
AmateurPhotographerUK, June 15, 2016
Fisheye, no. 6, May 14, 2014, pp. 8-9, 33-34
L'oeil de la photographie, April 14, 2014
National Press
Lenscratch, November, 17, 2017
The Caolinian, October 4, 2017
Audubon, August 3, 2016
Crave Online, August 21, 2016
sey-discovers-life-death
Slate.com, September 16, 2016
All about Photo.com, January 10, 2016
Art Fix Daily, March 29, 2016
Hyperallergic, July 13, 2016
Musee Magazine, June 16, 2016
PDN blog, March 22, 2016
Daylight Publishing, July 2016
Indy Week, December 23, 2015
News and Observer, October 13, 2015
Indy Week, August 26, 2015
Photo Booth ( blog), New Yorker, August 13, 2014,
Mother Jones, August 31, 2014,
Burnaway The Voice of Art in the South, June 3, 2014
Slate.com, March 4, 2014
Paris Review Daily (blog), Paris Review, July 24, 2013,
Southern Photographer, February 9, 2011
NC ArtBlog, Our Stories: A Community–Based Public Art Project, Jeff York, 2010
Shots Magazine, no. 105 autumn issue, 2009
The State of Things, NC Public Radio, 2009
Chapel Hill Herald, “Art’s Value Lies in the Stories behind It,” Rebekah, Cowell, 2009
Daily Tarheel, “Art Project Aims to Share History,” Mazare Rogers
Metro Magazine, “Marching,” Louis St. Lewis, 2008
Chapel Hill Magazine, Sept./October issue, 2008
Durham Magazine, August/September issue, 2008
Winston Salem Journal, Reviewed by Tom Patterson, August 10, 2008,
Yes Weekly, “Green Hill Gallery Hangs Art Garden,” August 2008, reviewed by Amy Kingsley
Metro Magazine, Review by Louis St. Lewis, June 2008,
Rambler Magazine, July August Issue, 2008
Book of Alternative Photographic Processes, Christopher James, 2008
Rambler Magazine, October/November issue, 2007
Independent Weekly, 2007
Durham Herald, Jan. 2006
WRAL TV, 2006
Independent Weekly, May 2003
Independent Weekly, March 2002 - 40k
Television, Radio & Podcast
WUNC, The State of Things, NPR affiliate, 2016,
Drunkbooksellers Podcast, July 2016,
WRAL TV, 2016,
WUNC The State of Things, NPR affiliate, 2015
WUNC The State of Things, NPR affiliate, 2013
WRAL TV, February, 2014,
Awards, Grants & Residencies
2018 Hewnoaks Artist Residency, Lovell Maine
CVPA Diversity Initiatives Mini-Grant, Greensboro, NC
Faculty Excellence award, The University of North Carolina Greensboro
2017 UNCG New Faculty Research Grant, Greensboro, NC
UNCG CVPA Grant, UNCG, Greensboro, NC
CLICK Triangle Photography Festival PIC grant winner
Faculty Excellence Award, The University of North Carolina Greensboro
2010 Grand Canyon Artist in Residence, National Park Service
2008 Emerging Artist Grant, Durham Arts Council
Orange County Artist Grant, Chapel Hill, NC
HABLA The Center for Language and Arts, Teaching Artist Residency, Merida, Mexico
2006 Vermont Studio Center Artist Residency, Fellowship, July 2006
The Duke Semans Fine Arts Foundation,
Gathering in the Stories, Duke Hospital, 2006
2000 Anderson Ranch Scholarship Award
1999 Alligator Juniper Print Competition
1998 Ernst Haas Golden Light Award: 3rd place, still life print competition
Ernst Haas Golden Light Award: named in the Top 100 Photographers in the Country
Juror/Panelist/Curator/Book Signings/Conferences, Artist talks
2018 Moss Arts Center, Virginia Tech, VA
2017 *GPS, 485 exhibition, curator, Greensboro, NC
University of North Carolina Greensboro, Gatewood Gallery, curator
*The Fence, Durham Arts Council, Artist talk
*The University of Alabama, Artist talk
*Juror, Durham Arts Council Emerging artists Grant, Durham, NC
*Conference presenter, Collections, at the Unleashing and confronting stories Of Bildung: Remediations
of cultural-natural heritage, University of Copenhagen, December 4-5, 2017
*Association of International Photography Art Dealers, NYC, Artist talk/Book signing
2016 Rayko Photo Gallery, Collections, San Francisco, CA, Book Signing
Weatherspoon Art Museum, Collections, Greensboro, NC, Artist talk and book signing
Durham Public Library, Collections, Durham, NC, Artist talk and book signing
21C Art Museum, Collections, Durham, NC, Artist talk and book signing
SF Camerawork, Collections, San Francisco, CA, Artist talk and book signing
2015 Carrack Modern Art, The Scanners, Durham, NC talk, Artist talk
Carolina Theater, Durham, NC, Artist talk, Bull City Summer, Panel discussion
Weatherspoon Art Museum, Observed / Examined / Fabricated, POV Talk with Leah Sobsey + Chris Poulos, Discussion with curator and panelist
2014 Contemporary Art Museum, Raleigh, Bull City Summer, Artist talk and book signing
2011 Curator, University of NC Greensboro Multi-Cultural Gallery, Black Marker Project
Curator, Jackson Library, UNC Greensboro, Shifting Grounds
2010 Juror/Curator, Jackson Library, UNC Greensboro Borrowed Narratives Exhibition
Juror, Center for Visual Artists 2010 Exposure Photo Biennial Exhibition, Greensboro, NC
Curator, University of NC Greensboro Multi Cultural Gallery, For Women By Women
2009 Juror, Emerging Artist Grant, Durham, NC
2008 Juror, International Festival of Film and Video Dance, American Dance Festival, Durham, NC
Panelist, Guilford College Art Symposium, Greensboro, NC
Panelist, Design, Art and Technology Symposium, University of North Carolina Greensboro
Films
Leaving Traces, dir. Ivan Weiss, 2014, documentary film covering the making of the book Bull City Summer
Selected Public and Private Collections
Cassilhaus Collection
North Carolina Museum of Art
Fidelity Investments
Rose Community Foundation
Habitat for Humanity, Durham, NC
Town of Chapel Hill
Bill Gates, Microsoft Collection
Maine Photographic Workshops
Rockport College Collection
San Francisco Art Institute
Duke University Medical Archives
Grand Canyon National Park