Dina Mitrani Gallery is proud to present Holly Lynton’s Bare Handed, with an opening and artist talk on Thursday, March 12th at 7 pm. This is the artist’s first solo exhibition at the gallery and brings together images from three related, but separate series that the artist has been working on for the last seven years.

From New England to the Lowcountry of South Carolina, the images narrate the stories of rural communities who have chosen to maintain ethical farming practices despite the pressures of industrial agriculture and new technology. The people in Lynton's photographs demonstrate a powerful yet intimate hands-on connection as they work meditatively in tandem with their environment. Bare Handed tells of the impalpable connections between man, creature, and the forces of nature to depict moments of wonder. The innate stillness that is captured in each photograph speaks of a graceful balance between preeminence and submission; and the carefully crafted compositions make subtle references to the history of art.

While photographing this body of work, Lynton often found herself amazed by the countless mythical and religious references that candidly appeared before her lens. With just a tilt of her head, the teenage girl in Sienna, Turkey Madonna, transformed into a rendition of the Virgin Mary. In her statement she writes, “Not always overt, I look for gestures and draw inspiration from religious paintings, mythology, and iconic tales of struggle to convey a sense of mysticism that is in the everyday.”

Holly Lynton received a BA from Yale University, and an MFA in Photography from the Milton Avery Graduate School of the Arts at Bard College. She has also been a visiting lecturer at Amherst College in Massachusetts and the Aegean Center for the Fine Arts in Paros, Greece.

Lynton's photography has been published in ARTnews, The New York Times, The New Yorker, The Village Voice, The Miami Herald, Photo District News, The Boston Globe, Oxford American, Water~Stone Review, and Preview Massachusetts. Recent awards include a Massachusetts Cultural Council Fellowship (2013), as well as The Syngenta Photography Award (2013). She was also nominated for the Prix Pictet (2012, 2013) and received an Artist Resource Trust Grant (2011). She was a finalist this year for the Maud Morgan Prize, Museum of Fine Arts Boston, and the St. Botolph Award. Lynton’s work has been exhibited nationally and internationally with solo and group exhibitions in New York City, Boston, Santa Barbara, Albuquerque, Atlanta, Berlin, London and the Netherlands.