Artist Talk - Focus Photography Club
Kayla Massey
Photographer

By: Steffen Francisco

Kayla Massey is a graduate student and photography teacher at the UW-Milwaukee campus as well as a local Wisconsin artist.  She was invited to speak at the UWM Focus Photography club’s artist lecture series.

The first thing that becomes obvious when approaching Kayla’s work is that it is almost always intensely personal.  She has yet to show any work that does not have a connection to her life, family or past in some way.  Contrary to the obvious assumption, however, her work has a way of resonating with many people of shared experiences. 

The most interesting part of her speech, however, was when she went into her graduate student work.  The process by which she went through different iterations and options, identifying the issues with each version and then improving them as she moved on to the final version was a great insight into the process of a photographer creating for a particular installation. 

Overall I thought this was a very good choice of topic for an undergrad program as it resonates with the kind of work that undergraduate students are likely to be creating going into finals and senior capstone experiences.