faculty profile

Leon Arieh Borensztein
Visiting Faculty
Photography

For the better part of my career I have focused on portraiture, from documenting domesticated animals, “Everyman” across this country, to disabled artists. In my portraiture I prefer to work in a situation that enables me to control the lighting. Another ongoing project is a visual documentation of Americana and the American lifestyle. My perspective, which has been influenced by spending my youth in an Eastern Block country, has given me a unique vision regarding the contemporary American experience. In my photography I believe in a straightforward, honest approach that nevertheless reveals what is beneath the surface.

Selected Exhibitions: 
  • Yerba Buena Center for the Arts, San Francisco, 2005 (solo)
  • Centre National de la Photographie, Paris, 1988 (solo)
  • Museum Of Modern Art, Cleveland, 1987 (solo)
  • Frankel Gallery, San Francisco, 1987 (solo)
  • San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, San Francisco, 2010 (group)
  • Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography, Tokyo, 1996 (group)
  • The Museum of Fine Arts, Huston 1991, (group)
  • Art Institute of Chicago Museum, Chicago, 1989 (three person)
Selected Publications: 
  • American Portraits 1979-1989, Nazraeli Press, 2011
  • One is Adam One is Superman, Chronicle Books, 2004
  • Local Colors: The di Rosa Collection of Contemporary California Art, Chronicle Books, 1999
  • Life Magazine, 1996
Education: 
  • MFA with Honors, San Francisco Art Institute, 1980
  • J.S. Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship, 1987