Curriculum Vitae and Collections
John Simboli is an American photographer and filmmaker known for one-to-one interactions with people and for graphic images of light-space-time.
John’s approach to image making is guided by photographers including August Sander, who said “The portrait is your mirror. It’s you.” John’s images of individual people are also informed by the perspective of Diane Arbus: “A photograph is a secret about a secret. The more it tells you, the less you know.”
John’s light-space-time photographs and films are influenced by the concepts of Laszlo Moholy-Nagy, who wrote “The magic possibility of framing a certain space and time is what brought me to photography. This process of recording elements of three dimensions in the flow of time, and fixing them in a two-dimensional image, creates a new context for the elements of the photograph.”
Mr. Simboli earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree in photography and filmmaking from Pennsylvania State University where he studied with Charles Werberig, Gerald Lang and Marc Hessel. John’s Master of Fine Arts degree is from Visual Studies Workshop in Rochester NY and the University of Buffalo where he studied with Nathan Lyons, Ray K. Metzker and Charles Traub. John was also a student of Malcolm Spaull and Charles Werberig in the Masters program in photography and film at the Rochester Institute of Technology.
Now based in Branford, CT, John enjoys his proximity to art and artists at nearby Yale University and in New York and Boston.
Mr. Simboli’s work has been shown in exhibitions throughout the country, including Pyramid Arts Center, Rochester, NY; 28 Arlington Gallery, Rochester, NY; Florida Museum of Photographic Arts, Tampa FL; Texas Photographic Society, Houston, TX; Rhode Island Center for Photographic Arts, Providence, RI; TAG Gallery, Los Angeles, CA; Blackstone Public Library, Branford, CT; Five Points Annex Gallery, Torrington, CT; Sebastopol Center for the Arts, Sebastopol, CA; PhotoPlace Gallery, Middlebury, VT; Greenwich International Film Festival, Greenwich, CT; Mequinensa International Film Festival, Spain; SeeMor Films Festival, Anglesey, U.K., Nature & Culture, Copenhagen, Denmark; Monza Film Festival, Monza, Italy; Éphémère ~ London Experimental Film, London UK; American Photographers Association show at American Photographers Association Juried Exhibition at SOHO Photo Gallery, New York; 5 Points Gallery, Pushing the Envelope, Torrington, CT; and the 45th Annual Juried Photographic Show, Carriage Barn Arts Center, New Canaan, CT.
John’s work is included in corporate and private collections in the US, Europe and Canada.