Copyright Cory Rice for the What is Photography project

Copyright Cory Rice for the What is Photography project

About the Artist

After 18 years as a public defender, SARA BENNETT turned her attention to photographing women with life sentences, both inside and outside prison. Her work has been exhibited in museum shows including in the Blanton Museum of Art’s Day Jobs, MoMA PS1’s Marking Time: Art in the Age of Mass Incarceration and the Museum of the City of New York’s New York Now: Home, and in solo shows, including at the Blue Sky Gallery in Portland, Oregon, Photoville in Brooklyn, New York, and Rotterdam Photo 2023. Her work has been featured in such publications as The New York Times, The New Yorker Photo Booth, and Variety & Rolling Stone’s American (In)Justice.

Like the women she photographs, Bennett hopes her work will shed light on the pointlessness of extremely long sentences and arbitrary parole denials. To bring Life After Life in Prison, The Bedroom Project, or Looking Inside to your community, please email her

 

Awards and Exhibitions (selected)

Finalist for consideration for a permanent public art commission, New York City (2023)

Emergent Laureate Award, International Women in Photo Association (2023)

Blanton Museum of Art, 4 prints in Day Jobs (2023)

Museum of the City of New York, 4 prints in New York Now: Home (2023)

Solo container exhibition at Rotterdam Photo 2023.

MoMA PS1, 6 prints in the Marking Time: Art in the Age of Mass Incarceration exhibition (2020)

The Blue Sky Gallery, Portland, OR (solo show) (2020)

Solo container exhibition at Photoville 2018 and Photoville 2019, Brooklyn, NY

The FENCE 2018, Category Home, Brooklyn Bridge Park, Boston, Atlanta, Denver, Durham, Santa Fe, Calgary, Sarasota, Houston

Capture Your Freedom, Franklin Delano Roosevelt Park, Roosevelt Island, New York City (jury prize winner for the category, Freedom from Fear) (2018)

The Davis Orton Gallery, Hudson, NY (solo show) (2019)

STILL HERE: Six Women, Sundance (solo show) (2020)

Photo Vogue Italia 2021, Reframing History

Open Wall Arles, Daily Life Singles category (2 images) (2020)

Miyako Yoshinaga Gallery, “Fermata 3 on 3” (2020)

Critics’ Choice Top 10, LensCulture Critics’ Choice 2020

Finalist, 2020 CDS Documentary Essay Prize in Photography

Shortlisted, 2023, 2022 & 2020 Blow Up Press Book Award

Top 50 Finalist, 2018 Critical Mass Competition and 2019 Critical Mass Competition

13th National Juried Exhibition, CERES Gallery, New York City (second place) (2018)

10th International Organ Vida Photography Festival, Museum of Contemporary Art, Zagreb Croatia (2018)

Indian Photography Festival 2018 Hyderabad (2018)

Shortlisted, Sienna International Photo Awards (2022)

Shortlisted, Athens Photo Festival (2019 and 2020)

One of 18 books chosen in the First Annual Photobook Juried Exhibition, Click! Photography Festival (2018)

INFOCUS Juried Exhibition of Self-Published Books at the Phoenix Art Museum (2014)

Acquisitions

The John Hay Library, Brown University. Three images from the series, Life After Life in Prison: The Bedroom Project (Aisha) (Jennifer) (Karen) and three images from the series, Looking Inside: Portraits of Women Serving Life Sentences (Assia) (Gloria) (Sahiah)

Museum of the City of New York, New York City (4 prints from The Bedroom Project)

The Pardon Office, Department of Justice. Looking Inside: Portraits of Women Serving Life Sentences is on long-term loan.

Talks, Podcasts, and TV

Photographing Incarceration Part 1 for Zeke Magazine, October 2023

The Freedom Exchange Project, June 2022

Artist Talk commissioned by Photoville in conjunction with PhotoWings (2020)

Chosen Family: Marking Time Artist Talk with Mary Baxter, Karen, and Leah (2021)

One-minuted video created for A Yellow Rose Project (2021)

Unjust and Unsolved, Episode 20 with Sara Bennett, January 2021

“Photography Wins! Sara Bennett and Joseph Holmes,” B&H Photography Podcast, January 2020

Ken Weingart: Interview with Sara Bennett (2021)

Photos and Parole, video by Trinity Wall Street, September 18, 2018

Eldridge & Co: Sara Bennett, photographer, CUNY TV, October 23, 2019

Eldridge & Co: Sara Bennett, photographer, and Karen Ely, former inmate, CUNY TV, March 21, 2018

Eldridge & Co: Sara Bennett’s “Life After Life in Prison.” CUNY TV, September 16, 2015

Publications

Incarceration Issue, Zeke Magazine, Fall 2023

Variety & Rolling Stone’s “American (In)Justice” (2019)

The Journal of Women and Criminal Justice, NJ Reentry Corporation (2021) (20 images from Looking Inside)

Harvard Kennedy School Journal of African American Policy (2021) (5 images from Looking Inside)

Synapsis: A Health Humanities Journal (2021) (5 images from Looking Inside)

Harvard Kennedy School Journal of African American Policy (2018-2019) (8 images from The Bedroom Project)