Tom Muir Wilson, Photographer

Photography · The Artist

Tom Muir Wilson, Photographer

Before Craft World Tours, there was the photographer and designer. These are original works from his own studio, released from the archive for the first time.

TrainedB.F.A., Cranbrook Academy of Art, 1958; M.F.A., Rochester Institute of Technology, 1961
Studied withMinor White and Nathan Lyons
George Eastman HouseDesigned and installed the Mees Gallery of the Science and Technology of Photography
TaughtRochester Institute of Technology and the Minneapolis School of Art

Studio portrait of Tom Muir Wilson with a full grey beard — Tom Muir Wilson (1930–2011).

Black-and-white photograph of Tom Muir Wilson at a drafting table — At the drafting table, likely during his design and teaching years.

Tom Muir Wilson with his three adult children outside a brick building — Tom with his three children.

Tom Muir Wilson asleep in a blue bus seat — Between stops: catching some sleep on the tour bus.

Tom Muir Wilson in a red shirt laughing against a stone wall — On the road, sharing a laugh.

His work moved between photography and printmaking, and he was awarded a prize at the Philadelphia Print Club in 1961. Read the full story of the founders →

On the record

Selected exhibitions

One-man shows: Rochester Institute of Technology (1960); Source Gallery, Lancaster, Pa.; Chatham College, Pittsburgh (1962); Minneapolis Institute of Art (1965); Willmar Junior College, Minnesota (1966); Rochester Art Center, Minnesota.

Group shows: Boston Arts Festival (1961); “Photography USA,” DeCordova Museum; “10 Photographers,” Schuman Gallery, Rochester; Print Club of Philadelphia (1962); “Four Photographers,” University of Hawaii; “Photography 63,” George Eastman House and New York State Exposition (1963); “Art of Two Cities,” New York (1965); Tweed Gallery, University of Minnesota Duluth (1966); RIT New Faculty Show (1967); “Photography–USA,” DeCordova (1968); Rundell Memorial Library, Rochester (1969); “Into the 70’s,” Akron Art Institute (1970).

Design & publications

Design and installation of the Mees Gallery of the Science and Technology of Photography, George Eastman House, covering optics, cameras, the photographic process, color, stereoscopy, cinematography and scientific applications.

Editor of Into the 70’s (Akron Art Institute, 1970), a selection of sixteen contemporary photographers with a foreword by Robert Doty of the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Solo catalog for the Rochester Art Center, printed from plates Tom prepared, with a foreword by Peter Seitz, Curator of Design at the Walker Art Center. In it, Tom described his purpose as exploring “the expressive potentials of the photographic medium.”

Roadscape

A series built from the language of the road: crossroads, T-junctions and hazard markers, photographed, cropped and printed until a road sign becomes a pattern. The earliest pieces are signed 1971; later prints are dated 1977 to 1979, and one was entered in West ’81: Art and the Law at the Minnesota Museum of Art.

Crossroads

Nine crossroads signs in a 3×3 grid, 1971.

T-Intersection

Nine T-intersection signs in a 3×3 grid, 1971.

Hammer and Sickle

A red hammer and sickle over a black-and-silver street scene.

See the full Roadscape series →

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