Biography
Michael Largent (°1953, Houston, Texas) is an adventurous artist and makes conceptual artworks through photography-based imagery. He is also an educator, photographer, graphic designer, and visual communicator who well-acquainted with the art and science of marketing and design.
Proud to be a Son of the Republic of Texas, Michael lived in Bad Nauheim, Germany for two years while his father (Sgt. Largent, of course) was stationed there. In 1972, he left his home state for the green mountains of Tennessee.
Michael studied under the legendary Tom Kilpatrick while earning his BA in Photography from TN Temple University in Chattanooga. There he was exposed to a wide variety of traditional and alternative processes such as pinhole, photograms, non-silver printing processes (cyanotype, gum bichromate, etc.), and to the photographers who shaped his earliest artistic vision.
Michael quickly developed his photography skills in his first career: working for photography and film production studios, two daily newspapers, and the local TV station. He also freelanced magazine and agency assignments from Maine to Washington and on location in several countries.
Michael more or less sat his camera down to focus on his second career in graphic and visual communication in the Atlanta market, climbing the ladder from graphic designer to art director to creative director to marketing director over the next 25 years.
However, in 2006 Michael picked up his cameras again and rediscovered the joys of image making. He also got his first taste of a teaching career as an Adjunct Instructor at Chattanooga State teaching graphic design courses. Beginning in 2013 he also began teaching photography and graphics courses at Covenant College in Lookout Mountain, GA, Southern Adventist University in Collegedale, TN, Dalton State College in Dalton, GA, with a couple of guest lecturer of photography stints at Lee University in Cleveland, TN.
Since 2015 he has been employed as a tenure track Associate Professor at Chattanooga State teaching Graphic Arts Technology courses and Digital Photography for Graphic Designers. In 2017 he graduated with a MFA-Visual Arts from Azusa Pacific University in Azusa, CA. Michael has found a new joie de vie in his third career as artist/educator and has no intentions on retiring until he stops loving what he is doing.
He has completed five "Every 50 Miles" photo-documentaries travelling around the USA and into eastern Canada. Michael is in the process of publishing a book for each of the journeys.
Michael currently lives in Georgia, north of Atlanta. He has been married to Debbie since 1975 and as of this writing, they have two married adult sons and two incredibly cute grand-dudes, and a grand-babe.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Some artists paint with oils. I paint with pixels.
By applying abstraction, Largent creates with often unnoticed yet recognizable elements, creating an unprecedented situation in which the viewer is confronted with the conditioning of their own perception and has to reconsider their own biased position.Largent creates art from digital photography, graphics, found imagery, and appropriated images.
Like Gerhard Richter and the very nature of photography itself, he refuses to be tied down to a single technique or approach. From straight photography to abstraction to hybrid forms incorporating other media, he often strays from the monotony of a single style or direction, preferring to discover the next way that photography can be explored.His work urges us to renegotiate photography as being part of a reactive or malleable medium. Largent is most influenced by the work of contemporary photographic artists who are challenging the traditional conventions of photography.
By focusing on techniques and materials, he creates by means of rules and intuition, acceptance and refusal, luring the viewer to reconsider their preconceived notions of the medium. His photo-imagery may or may not reference recognizable form. The results might be deconstructed or intervened upon to the extent that meaning is shifted and possible interpretation becomes multifaceted.
Largent is challenging the notion that the photograph needs to be representational or mimetic or simply two-dimensional. His current area of experimentation is with digital image manipulation and photo-sculptural techniques. One of Largent's goals as an artist is to hear his viewers say, “I would never have seen that.”
Starting with an original photograph or appropriated image, he may manipulate the image until it is unrecognizable as a photograph and takes on a new life of its own, creating forms, patterns and shapes as he will. His works are notable for their formal qualities in addition to the concepts on which they are based. This is of great importance and bears witness to his previous careers in photography and graphics.
CURRICULUM VITAE
EDUCATION
2017
MFA-Visual Arts | Azusa Pacific University, Azusa, CA
2014
Website Design : Audit | Chattanooga State, Chattanooga, TN
1989
Magazine Design : Audit | Portfolio Center, Atlanta, GA
1981
BA-Photography | Tennessee Temple University, Chattanooga, TN
SELECTED EXHIBITIONS
2024
“Things Around the House” | Juried Group Exhibition | Association for the Visual Arts, Chattanooga, TN
2023
“Soul of Jazz” Festival • Magnus Opus Award | Group Exhibition | Chattanooga State
2022
"Out of One, Many” selections | Solo Exhibition | Chattanooga State • “Soul of Jazz” Festival • Best of Show Award | Group Exhibition | Chattanooga State • Juried Group Exhibition | Association for the Visual Arts, Chattanooga, TN
2021
“Again+Again” | Curated Group Exhibition | CIVA Traveling Exhibition, Various Locations
2020
“Out of One, Many” | Solo Exhibition | Creative Arts Guild, Dalton, GA
2019
“A Post-Produced Reality” | Group Exhibition | Life Pacific University, San Dimas, CA • Juried Group Exhibition | Association for the Visual Arts, Chattanooga, TN • “Photography Neue” | Alumni Exhibition | Azusa Pacific University, Azusa, CA
2018
“Reconsidering Residuum” | Solo Exhibition | Chambliss Gallery, Chattanooga, TN • Juried Group Exhibition | INCubator/BDC, Chattanooga, TN
2017
“Reconsidering Residuum” | Solo Exhibition | Southern Adventist Univ., Collegedale, TN • “Reconsidering Residuum” | Solo Exhibition | Chattanooga State, Chattanooga, TN • “Reconsidering Residuum” | Solo MFA Thesis Exhibition | Heritage Gallery, Azusa Pacific University, Azusa, CA • “For Your Consideration” | MFA Graduates Group Showcase | Exhale Unlimited, Los Angeles, CA • “Interplay” | Jurored Group Exhibition | Shapeshifter Gallery, Chattanooga, TN • “HyperObjects” | Group Exhibition | Exhale Unlimited, Los Angeles, CA
2016
“A Show of Heads” | Juried Group Exhibition | Limmer Gallery, Hudson, NY • “Snap to Grid” | Juried Group Exhibition | LA Center For Digital Art, Los Angeles, CA • “Quartet Interpretations” | Juried Group Exhibition | Exit Gallery, Azusa Pacific University, Azusa, CA • “Resolution”| Group Exhibition | Exhale Unlimited, Los Angeles, CA
2015
“Recolor, Recover” | Group Exhibition | Exhale Unlimited, Los Angeles, CA • Juried Group Exhibition | Association for the Visual Arts, Chattanooga, TN • Juried Group Exhibition | INCubator/BDC, Chattanooga, TN
2014
Jurored Group Exhibition | Exhale Unlimited, Los Angeles, CA • Juried Group Exhibition | Association for the Visual Arts, Chattanooga, TN • “Home” | Juried Group Exhibition | Art/Not Terminal Gallery, Seattle, WA
2013
Juried Group Exhibition | Reflections Gallery, Chattanooga, TN • Juried Group Exhibition | District Gallery, Knoxville, TN
2012
“Shapes of Futures Past” | Solo Exhibition | Creative Arts Guild, Dalton, GA • “Bokeh & Zen” | Solo Exhibition | Chattanooga Theatre Centre, Chattanooga, TN • Juried Group Exhibition | Reflections Gallery, Chattanooga, TN
2011
“Retrospective” | Solo Exhibition | Tennessee Temple University, Chattanooga, TN • “Bokeh & Zen” | Featured Artist | In-Town Gallery, Chattanooga, TN
2010
Juried Group Exhibition | Association for the Visual Arts, Chattanooga, TN
TEACHING EXPERIENCE
2015–Present
Chattanooga State, Chattanooga, TN
| Associate Professor, Graphic Arts Technology
Spring Semesters 2022 and 2024
Dalton State College, Dalton, GA
| Adjunct Instructor, Graphic Design
Fall Semester 2017
Southern Adventist University, Collegedale, TN
| Adjunct Instructor, Graphic Design
2013 - 2016
Covenant College, Lookout Mountain, GA
| Adjunct Instructor, Photography and Graphic Design
2006–2011
Chattanooga State, Chattanooga, TN
| Adjunct Instructor, Graphic Arts Technology
PROFESSIONAL ORGANIZATION AFFILIATIONS
American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA)
Christians in the Visual Arts (CIVA)
College Art Association (CAA)
Society for Photographic Education (SPE)
PRIVATE COLLECTIONS
Works held in private collections in the United States and internationally.