# 12 - Judy Sánchez - May 21, 2017 - Clifton, Virginia
Sunday, August 6, 2017
Judy Sánchez was a photography professor of mine when I attended the Rochester Institute of Technology from 1989-93. Judy taught a number of courses in photography at RIT and also graduated from there in the late 1970's. She is extremely well versed in the analog world of photography, especially large format black and white work. She also did a good amount of advertising work in the 1980's and 1990's.
Raised in Spain, Judy spent most of her life there until high school, at which point she attended an international boarding school in Italy to perfect her English. She traveled the world for a number of years, and as she told me, "thought she disliked cold weather", skipping over the equator once the seasons changed in order to avoid the cold. After spending a season working on an expedition ship in Antarctica, she changed her mind. Soon after, she moved to Alaska as part of an artist in residence program with the National Park Service. She decided to stay in Alaska and has lived there since 2000, working jobs ranging from art teacher to commercial fisherwoman. Returning to the university, she earned a clinical degree in health and served as a Community Health Aide in the remote Alaskan bush village of Anaktuvuk Pass, an Iñupiat community of about 300 people north of the Arctic Circle. Accessible only by plane, Judy lived and worked in Anaktuvuk for nearly 8 years providing healthcare. She now lives in a much more accessible town in Alaska - North Pole!
North Pole is located just outside Fairbanks and it shares the same latitude as portions of southern Greenland and Iceland. It gets pretty cold in the winter with an average low in January of -17°F - though it often gets much colder. Judy mentioned that it stayed about -40°F for about three weeks this past winter. When the weather stays that cold, her cars will not start, even if plugged into an engine block heater. The soles of shoes stick to surfaces like Velcro because they freeze instantly.
I had the opportunity to photograph Judy because she has been visiting with her 94-year-old mother who lives not far from me in Virginia. I had not seen Judy since I graduated from RIT 24 years ago.
I chose a location that seemed appropriate for her, which was next to water. She made beautiful and lush landscape photos of flowing water, rivers, nature, but often images of water from my memory. She continues to photograph water, although now it is most often ICE.
Raised in Spain, Judy spent most of her life there until high school, at which point she attended an international boarding school in Italy to perfect her English. She traveled the world for a number of years, and as she told me, "thought she disliked cold weather", skipping over the equator once the seasons changed in order to avoid the cold. After spending a season working on an expedition ship in Antarctica, she changed her mind. Soon after, she moved to Alaska as part of an artist in residence program with the National Park Service. She decided to stay in Alaska and has lived there since 2000, working jobs ranging from art teacher to commercial fisherwoman. Returning to the university, she earned a clinical degree in health and served as a Community Health Aide in the remote Alaskan bush village of Anaktuvuk Pass, an Iñupiat community of about 300 people north of the Arctic Circle. Accessible only by plane, Judy lived and worked in Anaktuvuk for nearly 8 years providing healthcare. She now lives in a much more accessible town in Alaska - North Pole!
North Pole is located just outside Fairbanks and it shares the same latitude as portions of southern Greenland and Iceland. It gets pretty cold in the winter with an average low in January of -17°F - though it often gets much colder. Judy mentioned that it stayed about -40°F for about three weeks this past winter. When the weather stays that cold, her cars will not start, even if plugged into an engine block heater. The soles of shoes stick to surfaces like Velcro because they freeze instantly.
I had the opportunity to photograph Judy because she has been visiting with her 94-year-old mother who lives not far from me in Virginia. I had not seen Judy since I graduated from RIT 24 years ago.
I chose a location that seemed appropriate for her, which was next to water. She made beautiful and lush landscape photos of flowing water, rivers, nature, but often images of water from my memory. She continues to photograph water, although now it is most often ICE.
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