The Formation of a Line or Whose Line is it Anyway?

Colin Stearns is an Associate Professor of Photography at Parsons School of Design. He is a photographer dedicated to the form of the photobook.

Colin has authored photobooks published by RITA BOOKS (2015) and KGP+ (2017). In 2018, he began self-publishing his work to explore publishing as an art form. In 2021, he founded Nonlinear Books, an experimental publishing venture aimed at advancing the form, function, and language of the photobook. The primary focus of Nonlinear Books is addressing issues surrounding race, patriarchy, and disenfranchisement. A central tenet of this initiative is ensuring affordability for all, while also prioritizing support for underrepresented photobook makers. 

Colin's photobooks are included in collections at prominent institutions such as The International Center of Photography Library, The New York Public Library, The New School Library, Ronald Feldman Gallery, Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library at Yale University, The Sloane Art Library at the University of North Carolina, and the Hellenic Centre for Photography in Athens, Greece. 

Colin has been walking, researching and photographing the Mason-Dixon Line to better understand the formation of the pre- and post-constitutional United States as a country conceived with the goal of White Supremacy. The research started in the early years of the Presidency of Barack Obama and continues now with the current Biden administration. Colin was born in and grew up in the southern United States, a distinction made possible from geographic relationship to the Mason-Dixon Line. He was schooled and learned from systems that made their own histories and with this work he questions everything he sees. 

During the year as a GIDEST fellow, Colin will be completing the research for and creating a photobook called “The Line.” The research is extensive, delving deep into history and personal experience. It oscillates from exploring the deep historical significance of the space to understanding the current realities of living near this mythic border of freedom, to reflecting on his own identity as someone who identifies as a southerner. Even now, we see this historical formation still very much present, as evidenced by the events of January 6th, 2021. All of the exchanges at GIDEST will help shape the narrative of the photobook and accompanying exhibition.