Michael Burns | American, 1942 -
Michael Burns earned a BFA in Painting at the University of Washington, Seattle (1966), and an MFA in Painting at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst (1969).
His early photographs were created using an 8x10 inch view camera, which Burns used for several years to photograph urban architecture and enigmatic, vernacular architectural structures he found in the desolate desert areas of the Great Basin in the Western United States. The resulting contact prints are rich with description and luminous in tone.
His work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, including solo exhibitions at the Silver Image Gallery, Seattle (1977, 1979); Seattle Art Museum (1982, 1987); Museum of Contemporary Photography, Chicago (1986).
Burns’ work is within the collections of the Center for Creative Photography, Tucson; Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris, France; Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; New Orleans Museum of Art; Seattle Art Museum; and University of Oregon Museum of Art, Eugene.
He was the recipient of the National Endowment for the Arts Photographer’s Fellowship (1980) and a Henry Art Gallery, University of Washington, Fellowship in Rome (1987).