Allan Pierce

From earliest childhood as an avid theater-goer, I have been consumed with the interactions of people, their emotional masks and subtexts and the environments and situations that define their lives. As I studied theater for many years and taught English and the creative arts, I also directed and performed in many plays (both traditional and experimental) in New York, Princeton and Seattle. Observing humanity and imagining their narratives have continued to be consuming passions. A similar perspective pervades my photography. I am continually reminded of the deep influence that my theater training and experiences in directing, acting, set design and lighting have had on my vision when creating photographic imagery. 

In approaching portraiture, for example, I’m looking to capture the inner life of a person in unguarded moments and not to depict a “flattering,” air-brushed conformity that’s so prevalent in studio photography. I am especially excited by the limitless range of natural-lighting situations rather than the forced predictability and blandness that can result from getting mired in the limitations of technique. In creating characters and narratives, the spontaneity of improvisational theater techniques is often integrated in the photographing of models. Planning for a photo shoot is often similar to rehearsing for a performance. 

During the past five years, my portrait work has concentrated on modern interpretations of mythological figures. Several of the resulting images are represented in this website. And in the series, The Remains of the American Dream, the focus is on the devastation of the marginalized in society, which has been a recurrent theme in my work. These images are confrontational and didactic. They are an alienating reminder of a bleak world around us that we might easily prefer to ignore. I often find a certain elegiac poetry in the lives of the disenfranchised, hoping to inspire compassion and humanity in the viewer. Many of the images document the destruction and ravages of time left in the wake of progress. Abandoned and decaying buildings evoke a last glimpse of beauty before the wrecking ball strikes. An image can tell a story not only of what is, but also of what was and perhaps what’s to come. 

My work has been shown at the Soho Photo Gallery in New York, the University of Miami, Florida International University, the Boca Museum of Art, Plough Gallery in  Tifton, Georgia, the Artists’ Guild Gallery in Delray Beach, World and Eye and  the Chris Lopez Gallery in Fort Lauderdale, and recently in Atlanta at the Ernest G. Welch Gallery. I recently published a collection of homoerotica, Memories of the Village: New York, circa 1985-1995, Photos by Allan Pierce, which is available for sale at my website, AllanPierce.Com. I am currently teaching photography at The Art School of The Boca Museum of Art in Boca Raton, Florida and am co-director of “Interactive Photo Online Workshops” with Dennis Sperling.