Melissa Springer
Melissa Springer (born 1956) is a photojournalist and artist. Her work has been featured in over 50 magazines, including Aperture, Elle, Forbes, Harpers Bazaar, The New York Times Magazine, Los Angeles Times Magazine, Southern Living, Village Voice and House and Garden, as well as in numerous books.
Springer studied art and photography at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
Springer's "Julia Tutwiler Prison Series" was the first show exhibited at the Agnes gallery. Highlights from the series were published in Elle and she was interviewed on CNN about the project.
Her photographs were part of the travelling exhibition The South By Its Photographers, and were published in its accompanying book. She and Jim Neel photographed snake-handling congregations for Dennis Covington's book Salvation on Sand Mountain. Her photographs of breast cancer survivors were the subject on an exhibit at the UAB Comprehensive Cancer Center with an accompanying book.
In 2006 Springer sold her studio at 2311 Morris Avenue and moved to New York City to join the faculty of the International Center for Photography. Soon later her father took ill in Florida and she relocated again to become his primary caregiver. During that time she became reacquainted with her father and took over 2,000 portraits of him. After his death she returned to Birmingham and has been shooting freelance assignments for Southern Progress and working to initiate a health-care union for working artists.
Springer's son, Paul Rogers, is an Academy Award-winning film editor.
Publications
- Neel, Jim and Melissa Springer (1996) Salvation on Sand Mountain: Photographs by Jim Neel and Melissa Springer. Alexandria, Louisiana: Alexandria Museum of Art. ISBN 0944564054
- Springer, Melissa (1996) A Tribe of Warrior Women: Breast Cancer Survivors. Birmingham: Crane Hill Publishers. ISBN 1575870495
- Springer, Melissa (1998) Important Things. Birmingham: Crane Hill Publishers. ISBN 1575870614
References
- Stancill, Mary Ellen (May 2007) "Melissa Springer". Birmingham Magazine. Vol. 47, No. 5, p. 34
- Kemp, Kathy (December 23, 2008) "Birmingham photographer Melissa Springer still loves doing what she's always done." Birmingham News
External links
- Melissa Springer website
- Across America with Larry Woods (video)