Instructors
We strive to create and maintain working and learning environments that are inclusive, equitable and welcoming. If you are interested in becoming a photography instructor for us, please email a resume to [email protected].
Morgain Bailey
Morgain Bailey is a multidisciplinary visual artist whose documentary landscape work has been inspired by the New Topographics movement and the personality of place. Originally from San Francisco, California, where she is alumna of the San Francisco Art Institute, she now lives in the northeastern corner of rural Maine. Her work has been featured by the Tacoma Art Museum and the Maine Museum of Photographic Arts. She creates long-term photography projects and teaches creative photography workshops to global audiences.
Marisa Brown
Marisa Brown is mixed media artist, photographer, and art teacher local to Fort Collins, Colorado. She grew up in Northern Colorado where she attended Colorado State University. She earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts with a concentration in photography and art education in 2015. Since then, she has been teaching art and photography in public schools in the Denver metro area and pursuing her own artistic passions. She is deeply interested in mixing media, connecting with nature, and producing conceptual bodies of photographic work. She loves shooting medium format and instant film as well as working in the darkroom – especially using a color processor to produce chromogenic prints.
Shawn Bush
Lens-based artist Shawn Bush (he/him/his) grew up in Detroit, MI, a city whose civic history and geographic location have profoundly influenced how he thinks about physical space within American sociopolitical and socioeconomic landscapes. As a result, his photographs and collages are responsive to over-built systems, failing icons, and collapsing mythologies. Bush is the founder of Dais Books and Assistant Professor of Photography at Casper College. He earned an MFA from Rhode Island School of Design and a BA from Columbia College Chicago. He is a 2021 recipient of the Aperture CreatorLabs Photo Fund, a 2021 Wyoming Arts Council Fellow, and a 2017 Lenscratch Student Prize winner. He has published two photo books: Golden State (Skylark Editions, Chicago, IL, 2018) and Between Gods and Animals (VOID, Athens, Greece, 2021).
Kimberly Chiaris
Kimberly Chiaris received her BFA in Photography from the Kansas City Art Institute. Her interest lies mainly in personal storytelling through hand made processes. Her practices often involve digital composites combined with analog and alternative processes that include elements of mixed media. Her focus is primarily on themes of origin and identity and how trace memory, emotions, time and culture shape and shift our understanding of history. She has been published in Christina Z. Anderson’s book – Cyanotype-The Blueprint in Contemporary Practice, The Hand Magazine, Shadow and Light Magazine, Shots Magazine, RfotoFolio, L.A. Photo Curator and HM Hard Music Magazine. Kimberly also loves teaching and igniting curiosity in people through art processes. She has taught numerous photo based art classes and workshops at Universities, Colleges, Museums, galleries, Artist associations and nonprofit organizations.
Heather Canterbury Marks
Heather Canterbury Marks, born and raised in South Arkansas, holds an MFA from the University of Texas at Austin. She received her BA in Art from the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. As a Studio Art MFA candidate at the University of Texas at Austin, she received the Doolin Scholarship for Studio Art, Russell Lee Endowed Presidential Scholarship in Photography, and the William and Bettye Nowlin Endowed Presidential Fellowship in Photography. Her art practice stems from action, intention, and intuition. Her camera serves as a conduit for magnifying her experiences as she navigates and interacts with daily life. Her work has been shown in New York, Texas, Colorado, and Arkansas. Heather currently lives in Denver, CO.
Shana Cruz-Thompson
Shana Cruz-Thompson is an experimental photographer who is passionate about community outreach and arts education. She teaches several workshops yearly through her burgeoning nonprofit Project Photo Op which seeks to empower youth through photography workshops, mentorships, and exhibitions. Shana supports her community as an Arts in Public Places commissioner for the City of Aurora and is an active board member of Denver Digerati. As the founder and curator of Vigilante Darkroom Zine, she highlights women working in experimental analog processes. Shana holds a BFA in Photography from University of Colorado Denver and currently teaches middle school in the Cherry Creek School District.
Trent Davis Bailey
Trent Davis Bailey is a photographer born and based in Colorado. He is the recipient of numerous awards, including a 2019 Film Photo Award and the 2015 Snider Prize from the Museum of Contemporary Photography. His work has been shown widely in the US and abroad, including exhibitions at Somerset House in London and Robert Koch Gallery in San Francisco, and at art fairs and festivals such as Paris Photo and the Encontros da Imagem Photography Festival in Portugal. His photographs have appeared in The New York TImes Magazine, T: The New York Times Style Magazine, The Atlantic, The California Sunday Magazine, ProPublica, SSAW, and elsewhere. Bailey holds an MFA from the California College of the Arts and a BFA and BA from the University of Colorado Boulder.
Todd Dobbs
I am a classically trained fine art photographer holding an MFA with several decades of experience creating art and over a decade of teaching. My work explores analog and digital technology and the intersections that exist when they are combined, and the concepts I work with are arrived upon by embracing my imagination and allowing it to guide me in the creative process.
Marc Feldman
Marc Feldman is a professional sports, commercial, and real estate photographer with over 25 years experience. He is a graduate of The University of Southern California Film School and Art Center College of Design. He owned and operated his own advertising and commercial production companies in Los Angeles. He was the Senior Staff Photographer for Golf Illustrated and GolfWeek Magazines and was a contributing photographer for Getty Images and WireImage, on the PGA Tour and all other professional sports. Marc’s work has appeared in every major sports magazine throughout the world and has received numerous awards for both his commercial and editorial work.
Jesse Freidin
Jesse Freidin has been America’s leading fine art dog photographer for the past 15 years, and now focuses his attention on elevating the experience of the trans/tgnc community through portraiture and interviews. His photography is part of over 150 private collections and has been exhibited in galleries from coast to coast. He is a teacher and mentor, specializing in helping artists build businesses with confidence. Jesse’s work has been featured in The New York Times, Vogue, Cosmopolitan, The Huffington Post, Them, Inside Edition, and many more. He is the author of two books: ‘Finding Shelter’ (Lyons Press, 2017) and ‘When Dogs Heal’ (Lerner Books, 2021).
Patricia Howard
Patricia Howard is a Colorado photographer and educator. She has shown her photographic work nationally and in Ireland, where she has completed two residencies. In 2018, she received a fellowship to the Vermont Studio Center and was part of the Photographers’ Master Retreat in France. She taught photography and digital art at Juniata College and Penn State. Patricia’s photography often focuses on the conceptual and incorporates a strong element of storytelling. She is a graduate of the University of Delaware, received her MFA from Penn State and currently teaches remotely with the Smithsonian Associates in Washington, DC.
Mari Howells
Mari Howells is a visual artist and teacher based in New York. She is an adjunct professor at Pratt SCPS, NY where she teaches a class in visual literacy. She received a Masters of Fine Art in photography from The Royal college of Art, London, with a distinction in research, and a Masters of Fine Art in Theatre, from Columbia University. She is a classically trained cellist, pianist and guitarist and worked with the renowned composer Rahayu Supanggah in Indonesia. Her photography draws on her theatrical and musical background, combining aspects of both through the filter of photography. Her work was most recently exhibited at Cromwell Place, London, UK.
Bree Lamb
Bree Lamb is an artist, educator and editor based in New Mexico. She is Assistant Professor of Photography at New Mexico State University, and for the last six years, Lamb has been the Managing Editor for Fraction Magazine, an online venue dedicated to fine art, contemporary photography, that brings together diverse bodies of work by established and emerging artists from around the globe. She has reviewed portfolios at national and international events including Review Santa Fe, Medium Festival of Photography, Mt. Rokko Photography Festival, the Society for Photographic Education National Conference, New England Portfolio Reviews, Month of Photography Denver, and Photolucida.
Dona Laurita
In the midst of creating and showing her own creative work, Dona helps adolescents and adults learn new skills and pursue their artistic vision. She has facilitated experiential learning programs in many schools and institutions, including the Denver District Attorney’s Office Restitution Project and the Migrant Workers’ Program. As a community-based artist, she has collaborated with Think 360 Arts, Eco Arts Connections, One Action 2016: Arts + Immigration Project, and Boulder Sister Cities Project involving Tibet and Nicaragua. Through Naropa University, she documented the Dalai Lama’s 1997 visit to Colorado. She’s received numerous local, state, and national grants, including an NEA grant.
Suzi Moore McGregor
Suzi Moore McGregor is an educator and the author of several books. She continues to create complex composites on her mobile devices and generously shares her ‘special sauce’ with her students.
From her website: “We are all in stages of migration, whether moving from one neighborhood to another or traversing the planet. My specific goal is to see as much as possible, connect with diverse populations, learn from them and record my journey with words, photos, drawings, and collage.”
Kia Neill
Kia Neill is a photo based mixed media collage artist whose work is inspired heavily by mountain landscape and culture. In her work she superimposes multiple images, uses color and abstraction metaphorically, in order to create surreal landscapes with an emphasis on energetic vibrancy and layers of narrative.Native to Chicago, she has lived in various parts of the country before finding home in the Rocky Mountains. She received her MFA from The University of California San Diego and has taught a broad range of art for 20+ years. Neill additionally teaches for Breckenridge Creative Arts, and Think 360 Arts.
Ernest Nitka
Ernest Nitka is 35 year amateur photographer who currently shoots both film and digital. He both develops and digitizes film and has a wide range of experience with both analog and digital mediums. He is a native of Colorado and a neurologist by training. His father started him on the photography path at age 13 with various cameras, also teaching him darkroom basics. Nitka’s current long term project is titled, “Prairie Madness” which is also the title of his self-published book which has the main goal of raising money and awareness for prairie preservation.
Tim Richmond
Tim Richmond (b. 1959) is a British photographer based in Colorado specializing in long-term documentary projects. His first book, Last Best Hiding Place, was published in 2015, and his work is housed in many private collections and has been shown internationally. Richmond’s work has been featured in L’Uomo Vogue, Telegraph Magazine, Vanity Fair, Nearest Truth, BJP Nowness, i-D and many others. Love Bites, Richmond’s elegiac, sombre ode to a coastal stretch of the Bristol Channel, was published by Loose Joints in 2022. He is currently working on a new project, Project D, based near his home in Montrose, CO.
Ashlae Sheplar
Ashlae Shepler is a Denver artist who enjoys experimenting with old cameras, hiking in the mountains, biking trails and cuddling with her cat. She’s led a creative freelancing career for over 10 years in design and photography loves collaborating with creatives to push boundaries and drive stories through creative media. On occasion, her fine art photography has shown in galleries located in Dallas, Texas; Chicago, Illinois; Grand Rapids, Michigan and Denver, Colorado.
Michael Snively
Michael Snively is a Colorado native and professional photographer who, for more than 25 years, has created images for commercial and private clients, publications, presentations, and exhibitions. Michael is a traditionalist whose primary medium is B&W film, not out of fear of digital but out of respect for the traditions that have guided his career. Michael is a firm believer that photographic skills are best learned through mentorship. In addition to his technical skills, Michael is highly regarded for his emphasis on light and form.
Rayna Tedford
Rayna Tedford received her BFA in fine art photography at the University of Texas at Austin, and received her MFA in photography and media arts at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Her work has been exhibited at Galeria de Arte Fotografico Meliton Rodriguez, Medellin, Colombia; the Soho Photo Gallery in New York City, and other venues. She has taught traditional and digital photography classes at the University of Colorado Boulder, University of Colorado at Denver, Naropa University, and Anderson Ranch Arts Center.
Preston Utley
Preston Utley, is a freelance photographer based in Denver, CO. Preston has a bachelor’s degree in Photography from the Art Institute of Colorado and has been mentored by Magnum photographer Alex Webb, National Geographic photographer Sam Abell, and New Mexico based documentary photographer Norman Mauskopf. Preston has been a working photographer for almost 20 years. First as a photojournalist at a newspaper and for the past 10 years as a documentary wedding photographer. His interest in photography began as a way to connect with friends and family and has since spawned into a passion and a lifestyle. He is drawn to moments, light, and the human experience.
Julia Vandenoever
Julia Vandenoever is an editorial, commercial and fine art photographer. Julia has been honored to receive a couple of grants and served as a visiting artist at Guttman College in New York, New York. In 2021, Still Breathing, received a solo show at the Center for Photography at Woodstock as well as a Critical Mass Top 200 Finalist. Her work explores themes of memory, identity, place, and home. She was an artist-in-residence at the Boulder Creative Collective where she had a solo exhibition of her work, While I Wait. Her first monograph, Still Breathing, was published by Gray Sky Press in 2022. Still Breathing was recently acquired by Smith College Rare Books.
Frank Varney
Frank Varney has taught adult and teen workshops for CPAC, since 2016, and is the principal instructor for its annual Veterans Workshop Series now entering its 7th year. Frank was a co-instructor for 9 years at the FirstLight Visual Narrative Workshops with Jay Dickman. Frank served as the Photography Department Chair for the Art Institute of Colorado for 19 years, he has an MFA from Maine Media College, and has taught at RMCAD and RRCC. His work has appeared in numerous publications, including The New York Times, AARP The Magazine, Der Spiegel, ELLE, and Glamour.
Kenneth Wajda
Kenneth is an editorial and commercial portrait photographer based in Boulder, Colorado. From Kenneth: “As a 30-year professional photographer, I have a job I consider one of the best and genuinely a privilege to have. On any given day, I get to document people and their world and create images that tell their stories, whether for a magazine, news article, advertisement or annual report.” Kenneth believes in the importance of making photographic prints, he shoots digitally for commercial shoots and film for personal projects, he teaches workshops, exhibits in galleries, and coordinates a local salon with other photographers.
Ian Warren
Ian Warren is an architectural photographer and award-winning book artist living in Denver. Having asked for a subscription to Architectural Digest for his 11th birthday, his lifelong love of art and design led him to a BFA in Sculpture and an MA in Book Arts. You can find Ian most often looking through the lens of his camera, ice climbing, and perfecting his homemade taco recipe.
Liza Weems
Liza Weems is a photographer living in Boulder, Colorado. Her work has been exhibited in various one person and group shows in the United States and Europe. Liza has received awards for her work from the New York Center for Photographic Art, The Texas Photographic Society, The Camera Club of New York, The Boulder Arts Association, and the Latent Image, Journal of Photography. Liza enjoys sharing her passion for photography and has many years of experience teaching photography at the high school and college levels.
Denise Zubizarreta
Denise Zubizarreta is an interdisciplinary artist based in Arvada, CO. Zubizarreta explores post-colonial theory through mixed media artworks and installations. By investigating the 20th century cultural effects of colonialism within Latiné communities, she challenges the binaries between Self and “Other.” Traditions, memories, and contemporary life are blended in her work to honor, reclaim, as well as reinvent narratives of the past, present, and future.