Nancy Floyd: For the Love of Trees
December 7, 2024 – June 21, 2025
Study Gallery and Print Study Center
Nancy Floyd, "Field crew member Sydney Gastman measuring a Western Hemlock, H.J. Andrews Experimental Forest," 2023
Nancy Floyd: For the Love of Trees features recent work by this award-winning Bend, Oregon photographer and author. Born in Monticello, Minnesota, in 1956, Floyd was raised in League City, Texas. She received her BFA from the University of Texas at Austin, her MA from Columbia College in Chicago, and her MFA from the California Institute of the Arts in Santa Clarita. She taught photography at Georgia State University in Atlanta for many years before she retired and moved to central Oregon in 2018.
In 2022, Floyd was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship to embark on a multi-year project exploring the unique bond that Oregonians have with the forest and trees, including those who study trees, those who protect trees, those who make a living off trees, and those who see trees as part of their daily life. In the process, she has interviewed key stakeholders in the timber and forestry business; followed workers into the forest as they cut or studied trees; visited mills and shadowed those who work there; and accompanied workers at tree farms as they planted and nurtured trees. The exhibition will feature a range of work from the past two years.
Exhibition Related Events
In conjunction with the exhibition, Nancy Floyd will give a gallery talk on Tuesday, February 11 at 12:30 pm at the Hallie Ford Museum of Art, and on Thursday, March 6 at 7:30 pm at the Roger Hull Lecture Hall at the Hallie Ford Museum of Art. She will discuss her work with Julia Dolan, the Minor White Senior Curator of Photography at the Portland Art Museum. Admission to the gallery talk and lecture is free.
Photographer Nancy Floyd and Curator Julia Dolan to Speak
Salem, Ore—The conversation between photographer Nancy Floyd and Julia Dolan, the Minor White Senior Curator of Photography at the Portland Art Museum, that was cancelled on February 13 because of snow has been rescheduled. Floyd and Dolan will talk about the photographer’s art, life, and career in a 1:1 conversation scheduled for Thursday, March 6, 2025 beginning at 7:30 p.m. in the Roger Hull Lecture Hall at the Hallie Ford Museum of Art. Admission to the conversation is free.
Nancy Floyd received her BFA degree from the University of Texas, Austin, her MA degree from Columbia College in Chicago, and her MFA degree from the California Institute of the Arts in Santa Clarita. Floyd taught photography for many years at Georgia State University in Atlanta before she retired in 2018 and moved to Bend, Oregon. In 2022 she was awarded a prestigious Guggenheim Fellowship to embark on a multiyear project that explores the unique bond that Oregonians have with the forest and trees.
Julia Dolan has been the Minor White Curator of Photography at the Portland Art Museum since 2010 and senior curator since 2022. She holds a BFA degree in photography from the Maryland Institute College of Art, an MA degree in art history from Pennsylvania State University, and a PhD degree in art history from Boston University. Over the past fifteen years, she has helped build the Portland Art Museum’s photographic collection and has curated, co-curated, or hosted over 50 photography exhibitions.
Floyd is the subject of a solo exhibition at the Hallie Ford Museum of Art. Nancy Floyd: For the Love of Trees, which continues through June 21, 2025 in the Study Gallery and Print Study Center, features photographs taken by Floyd at the H.J. Andrews Experimental Forest near Blue River, Oregon and Zena Forest outside of Salem over the past two years that explore the unique bond that Oregonians have with the forest and trees, including those who study trees, those who protect trees, those who make a living off of trees, and those who see trees as a part of their daily life.
The Hallie Ford Museum of Art is located at 700 State Street (corner of State and Cottage Streets) in downtown Salem near the campus of Willamette University. Hours are Tuesday through Saturday from 12 noon to 5 p.m. The galleries are closed on Sunday and Monday. Admission is $8 for adults and $5 for seniors (55+). Children and students (0-17) and students (18+ with ID) are admitted for free, and Tuesday is a free day.
For further information, please call 503/370-6855.
Financial Support
This exhibition is supported with funds from the HFMA Exhibition Fund and
the Maribeth Collins Art Exhibition Fund; by advertising support from The Oregonian/Here is Oregon; and by general operating support grants from the City of Salem's Transient Occupancy Tax funds and the Oregon Arts Commission.
Further information
For further information contact:
John Olbrantz, the Maribeth Collins Director, Hallie Ford Museum of Art
Phone: 503-370-6854
Email: jolbrant@willamette.edu
