Thomas Allen | American, 1963 -
Contemporary photographer Thomas Allen began his signature process of repurposing books in college when a professor saw the texts he had cut up (spawned from a childhood interest in pop-ups and dioramas), and encouraged him to seek his MFA. Allen continues to fashion narratives from the books he cuts and folds into three-dimensional vignettes. He uses pulp novels, vintage paperbacks, and textbooks, creating works that tell a story with the subjects of their adapted illustrations—characters such as cowboys, heroes, detectives, and villains. Allen refuses digital technology, insisting that an image fastened with tape and pins is much more of an illusion than anything created with a computer.
Allen received his BFA from Wayne State University and his MFA from the University of Minnesota. He was awarded a McKnight Fellowship for Photographers from the McKnight Foundation. His work was published in the celebrated monograph Uncovered by Aperture (2007).