Today we’d like to introduce you to Philip Ringler.
Hi Philip, we’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
I started photography in high school because I had a celebrity crush on Christina Applegate and read an interview that said she was interested in photography. I saved up enough money to buy a nice Canon film camera and signed up for classes in high school. I later wrote Christina Applegate a letter and shared some pictures, I got back a nice letter and signed portraits. I went to the Oakland Zoo with my dad and he pointed out how to look for shapes that look like animals, and really how to begin the practice of seeing as opposed to looking.
I started winning photography contests immediately and got excellent feedback from my teachers. I started working professionally in 1995 when I was hired as a college newspaper photographer for The Daily Aztec in San Diego. I worked my way up to Photo Editor and also started freelancing with other magazines and newspapers. I was very involved in the local underground music scene and spent a lot of time photographing live music shows.
I worked in photojournalism for about 7 years until I shifted to Fine Art. I bounced around a few different universities and finally landed at California State University, East Bay in Hayward, CA. I focused on the history and philosophy of the medium and shifted from journalism to conceptual (idea-based) fine art. I never lost my appreciation for the first lesson in the Zoo and turned my projects towards amusement parks, zoos, aquariums, and other areas designed as entertainment spaces for tourists.
I was able to use images of the infrastructure to convey metaphors of the human condition. I got my Bachelor of Fine Arts at CSU East Bay and then began graduate school at John F Kennedy’s Arts and Consciousness program. In graduate school, I explored Jungian alchemy and the human condition through a series called “Nocturnal Sunrise.” I made gigantic prints from the film in the darkroom, 45″x60″ silver gelatin black and white prints. The exhibition was a huge success and I got an MFA.
At the same time I was in graduate school I owned a photography business. I photographed artwork for artists and museums. I was also the Curator of the University Art Gallery for 13 years at CSU East Bay where I put on 3-4 exhibitions per year. In 2013 I was first invited to China where I fell in love with the country and the people. I decided to move there in 2015 after my divorce and moved right as the political situation was changing dramatically. I lived in China for two years, teaching art and English, doing an artist in residence, and exhibiting at both local galleries and large biennales.
In late 2016, and early 2017 I moved with my partner, Anna to Orlando where she grew up. I first got a job as a curator of a private collector’s African Art collection, but it turned out to mostly be replicas and fake artifacts so I left. I then couldn’t find any art jobs in Orlando so I became an Intake Coordinator for a chain of rehabs. This was the most emotionally exhausting job of my life but I was able to help a lot of people.
Since I’ve been in Orlando I’ve only had one chance to exhibit my fine art here. I was chosen for the billboard exhibition. I focus most of my attention on the international art community and show quite often in Italy and China. I recently started a new commercial photography business called Ringler Photo where I want to earn some money doing product photography. I will have a studio in College Park at my home and do professional shots with studio lighting. I’ve taught several university courses on studio photography and now just need to have interested local clients.
I have made a few good friends in the arts community here, like Patrick Greene and Patrick Kahn, but I still feel very isolated here and unconnected to the community. Strangely, it was easier in a huge place like the San Francisco Area to connect with artists, galleries, and museums. I’m trying though and hope I can find a way to feel at home here.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
As an artist, I’ve been rejected hundreds of times. One thing I learned is to shoot for the most rejections you can get. If you shoot for like 100 rejections a year, probably 10 of those will be acceptances. I’ve learned to be thick-skinned about criticism and to be confident in what I do. The whole idea of how artists make money and show work has changed dramatically since I got out of graduate school and continues to change.
It’s like navigating a chaotic ocean and having to adapt to the waves. One minute a gallery will be interested in your work and the next you will be forgotten. As far as museum work goes, it’s extremely hard to be an outsider from California trying to get a job in the South. Even though Orlando is a hip pocket of blue in a sea of red lava, it still has some social structures and invisible rules that are impossible to navigate unless you have inside connections.
And if you want to talk about obstacles with my time in China, there were many. I was fired as an art teacher for teaching “too much about art.” And I was kicked out of my artist residency for making “traditional Chinese cultural images about death.” I was bullied for being a foreigner and this was encouraged by Xi Jin Ping. Many of my friends, and my artist community in China are afraid to speak up and some have been sent to prison for making art. I try to help them by making political work about Chinese politics. I hope to find a museum here in Orlando that will show this work.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
In my fine art practice, I’m a conceptual photographer. That means the ideas are as important or more important than the image itself. There are many forms of conceptual photography but I primarily do constructed realities (set building and props) and found constructed realities (amusement parks, zoos.) I’m interested in artificial spaces designed to shift consciousness in tourists and to use those images to communicate something much larger than entertainment.
There aren’t many photographers working in this style and it is a relatively new way of interpreting images. It’s exciting to make work that people don’t understand. I’m proud to raise more questions than answers and I believe my work should be layered and complex but still have a sense of humor.
Is there a quality that you most attribute to your success?
I think my unwavering commitment to my vision is both a good thing for my soul and maybe bad for my pocketbook. I feel successful as a career artist because I’m showing internationally, but I still make almost no money and completely feel marginalized by mainstream curators. Maybe the money will come when I’m dead as it does for so many artists. If people could focus more on living, working artists we would probably be doing better.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.philipringler.com, RinglerPhoto.com
- Instagram: @philipringler
