MOLLY AHEARN BIO

Molly Ahearn has been photographing personally and professionally for more than 25 years. Best known for black-and-white documentary photograph essays of different aspects of life in America, Ahearn’s new work has taken a depature. Truth, Lies and Legends, is in intense color. She continues to explore photographing people, but in this series, no people are pictured. Ahearn has created sets for stories by inserting elements of her own choosing—a pair of fried eggs, a bicycle with a spinning wheel, a piece of crumpled aluminum foil. She shares a few possible stories to explain the scene and then invites viewers to write stories of their own.

Ahearn’s first book The Dutchess County Fair: Portrait of an American Tradition was published by Black Dome Press in 2007. Personal photo essays include Truth, Lies and Legends, Americana, Dutchess County Fair, Rodeo Cowgirls and Disappearing Farms of Westchester County. In 2008, Ahearn’s rodeo cowgirl images were selected for the Not Your Mama’s World exhibit at the Washington School of Photography and a solo show as part of the Arts in the Loft series at the Millbrook Vineyards in Millbrook, NY. In 2007, Ahearn collaborated with longtime associate Nadine Robbins on The Bad Dog Show, a photographic collection of objects destroyed during a puppy’s first year. With the help of the New York State Council for the Arts grant, Ahearn’s Dutchess County Fair images were the subject of two exhibitions in 2006.

Ahearn’s photographs have been published in several publications including The New York Times, Poughkeepsie Journal, Bioscience, Inside Out and Taconic Weekend. Professional assignments include documentary photography for Saint Francis Hospital in Poughkeepsie, NY, documentary work for the Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, NY, and a broad variety of studio and portrait assignments. She served her fourth year as a judge for the amateur photography competition at the Dutchess County fair in August 2008. Ahearn studied at the International Center of Photography in New York City and worked as assistant to acclaimed Magnum photographer Bruce Davidson on his personal photo essay of Central Park as well as his professional assignments.