Goodbody, also called a passionate collector, philanthropist, and humanitarian, experimented with myriad photographic strategies and genres all through her late-blooming profession. Documentary and summary pictures, digital collage, and Holga plastic digital camera pictures, and the mysterious course of of mordançage are among the many many approaches she embraced in her observe.
Born in Muncie, Indiana, in 1936, Goodbody took up pictures later in life, following a profession in public relations (spearheading former United States Secretary of State Edmund Muskie’s presidential marketing campaign led her to Maine within the early Seventies). A lifelong picture aficionado, she enrolled in a darkroom course on the Maine Photographic Workshops in Rockport upon turning 50. As a part of a gaggle of ladies often called the Rockport Six, Goodbody helped the varsity obtain accreditation to grant Masters of Wonderful Artwork levels and change into the celebrated Maine Media Workshops and School.
Barbara Goodbody, “Sunrise 1” (2009), inkjet print
The daughter of a naval officer, she was accustomed to touring and beloved immersing herself in different cultures. Her earliest pictures displays a documentary type, recording folks and locations she encountered. However as she dove deeper into her medium, Goodbody experimented with different processes; in Paris, for instance, she discovered the mordançage course of, an alternate method pioneered by Jean-Pierre Sudre within the Nineteen Sixties that includes chemically manipulating a print to realize a surreal, haunting impact. Her endgame was discovering strategies to elicit one thing extra profound about her topics than that which an easy picture might talk.
A scholar of comparative religions, Goodbody sought to convey the idea of “Indra’s net” — a Vedic scriptural metaphor for the interpenetration of all issues — by abstracting mild grids that implied an infinity of connection coursing by the universe. She exploited the low-fidelity blurring and light-weight leaks of a Holga plastic digital camera to seize the pale glory of Havana, and mordançage allowed her to carry emulsions from pictures of flowers, enhancing their sense of ephemeral magnificence by making them look already partially gone.
Even a dawn was by no means merely a dawn. Of Goodbody’s Salutations to the Daybreak (2009) collection, shot in Eire throughout the winter solstice, College of Texas professor of pictures Brenton Hamilton stated in a 2019 essay that in these pictures she “shows us light as a source of awakening.”
Barbara Goodbody, “Indra’s Net 1” (2012), inkjet print
Goodbody was additionally a prolific collector of pictures, portray, ornamental and ritualistic objects from Indigenous cultures and extra. She donated her personal works and components of her collections to many museums nationwide. However her fervid perception in world peace and alternative for all additionally impelled her into lively involvement and funding of many causes, together with co-founding the Massive Brothers/Massive Sisters of Maine, supporting the student-led Nobel-winning group PeaceJam and the Nationwide Wildlife Federation, jumpstarting the Heart for Compassion on the College of Southern Maine, and dealing with People Arts Rajasthan and the Tibetan Residence Faculty, amongst many others.
“Barbara’s compassionate worldview catalyzed Maine’s cultural infrastructure and shaped its landscape,” Denise Froehlich, director of the Maine Museum of Photographic Arts, which Goodbody additionally helped discovered, advised Hyperallergic. “Her institutional leadership and philanthropic initiatives established foundational frameworks that continue to influence the state’s artistic and sociocultural trajectory.”
Goodbody is survived by her three youngsters, Bridget, Robert, and Jim Goodbody; and 4 grandchildren, Ben, Abigail, Marcus, and Hannah.