sara davidmann curriculum vitae
Qualifications
PhD, (Photography practice-based), LCC, UAL 2007
MFA, State University of New York at Buffalo, N.Y., USA 1980
MA, University of Central England at Birmingham 1977
BA (Hons), 1st class awarded, University of Northumbria at Newcastle 1976
selected solo exhibitions
2021
My name is Sara, Four Corners Gallery, London E2 0QN
Curated by Katy Barron
2017
Ken. To be destroyed. Upper Gallery, LCC, London
Curated by Val Williams
Posters from ‘The Dress’. The LCC Studio, Elephant & Castle Shopping Centre London
Curated by Val Williams
The Ken Project Archive. PARCspace, LCC. Collaboration with Val Williams
2016
Ken. To be destroyed. Schwules Museum, Berlin
Curated by Val Williams
2015
Ken. To be destroyed installation, British Film Gallery, Victoria and Albert Museum, London
2014
Ken. To be destroyed (installation), University of Victoria, B.C., Canada
Ken. To be destroyed, Museum of Liverpool
Ken. To be destroyed, LimeWharf Gallery, Fringe! Film and Arts Festival, London
Ken. To be destroyed, PARCspace, LCC, UAL
2013
Ken. To be destroyed. Unity Theatre, Liverpool, part of Homotopia’s 10th Anniversary Arts Festival
2009
In/visible Genders, LBGT Centre, Paris, part of Transgenders: New Identities and Visibilities conference, Sorbonne Nouvelle, Paris-3
2006
transfiguration, FUTURE*QUEER, University College Dublin, Ireland
2003
nu-gender, APT Gallery, London
2000
Orlando's Butterflies, MOMA Oxford, Lower Gallery
Selected Group Exhibitions
2017
Catharsis. Belfast Exposed, October 27-December 23. With Amak Mahmoodian and Mariela Sancari
Ken. To be destroyed (digital installation), Focus Mumbai Photo Festival, India
2015
Trans* Portraits. In April Ashley: Portrait of a Lady. Museum of Liverpool (2013-2015)
Extreme. Two-person exhibition/collaboration with Catherine Faulds. The Glass Tank, Oxford Brookes University
2012
Trans*_Homo: of Lesbian Trans* Gays and Other Normalities, Schwules Museum, Berlin
2011
finds 1. The Well Gallery, LCC, UAL
2009
ReImag(in)ing SomaSex, Macquarie University Gallery, Sydney, Australia
Censored, SHOUT Festival, Birmingham
2007
Every Noble Work Is At First Impossible. Two-person exhibition/collaboration with Stephen Whittle OBE. Somatechnics, Sydney, Australia
2006
Getting Wed. Two-person exhibition/collaboration with Stephen Whittle OBE. Part of ‘Transfabulous’, 1st International Festival of Transgender Arts, London
2005
Somatechnics, Macquarie University Gallery, Sydney, Australia
2000
Basel Art Fair, Schweizer Mustermesse, Basel, Switzerland
Paris Photo, The Louvre Carousel, Paris, France
Victoria And Albert Museum events 2015
Held in connection with the Ken. To be destroyed project
Quests for Lost Histories: In Conversation with Prof Jack (Judith) Halberstam. Queer and Now Friday Late
To Be Destroyed: In Conversation with Zorian Clayton, Assistant Curator of Prints, Victoria & Albert Museum. Discussion to accompany the screening of Ahmed Ateyya’s film To Be Destroyed about the making of Ken.To be destroyed. Part of the British Film Institute Flare Festival
Publications: Monographs
2021
Mischling 1. GOST books
Foreword by Philippe Sands
Shortlisted for Les Rencontres d’Arles Photo-book Awards, 2022
2016
Ken. To be destroyed. Edited by Val Williams. Schilt Publishing, Amsterdam Essay by Val Williams
2003
Crossing the Line. Dewi Lewis Publishing
Publications: photo-series, Journal Articles and Book Chapters
2021
My name is Sara, Jewish Renaissance, Summer issue
2020
Eve, Adam and the Garden of Earthly Delights. Book chapter in Entanglements and Weavings: Diffractive Approaches to Gender and Love. Byrne, D.C. and Schleicher, M. (eds.). Published by Brill
2017
Photoworks Annual Issue 24. Series featured: Eve, Adam, and the Garden of Earthly Delights. Essay by Karin Bareman
The Ken. To be destroyed Project Archive. Journal article co-authored with Val Williams. Photography and Culture, Volume 10, Issue 1, pp 77-84
2015
Re-imag(in)ing Life-making, or Queering the Somatechnics of Reproductive Futurity. Book chapter co-authored with Nikki Sullivan. In Critical Kinship Studies: Kinship (trans) formed. Kroløkke, C., Adrian, S. & Myong, L. (eds.). Published by Rowman & Littlefield
Queering the Trans* Family Album. Journal article co-authored with Elspeth Brown. In Queering Archives: Intimate tracings. Special Journal Issue of Radical History Review. Issue 122. Marshall, D., Tortorici, Z. & Murphy, K. (eds.)
2014
Ken. To be destroyed. Fieldstudy 19. Edited by Val Williams. Published by Photography and the Archive Research Centre, LCC, UAL
Transsexual Experiences: Photography, gender and the case of the emperor's new clothes. Book chapter in Transgender Experience: Place, Ethnicity and Visibility. Zabus, C. & Coad, D. (eds.). Published by Routledge
Imag(in)ing Trans Partnerships: Collaborative photography and intimacy. Journal article in Trans Sexualities. Special Journal Issue of Journal of Homosexuality. Vol. 61, issue 5. Pfeffer, C. (ed.). Published by Taylor and Francis
2010
Beyond Borders: Lived experiences of atypically gendered transsexual people. Book chapter in Transgender entities: Towards a social analysis of gender diversity. Hines, S. & Sanger, T. (eds.). Published by Routledge
2006
Border Trouble: Photography, strategies, and transsexual identities. Journal article in SCAN: Journal of media, arts, culture. Vol. 3, issue 3. Anderson, N. & Sullivan, N. (eds.). http://scan.net.au/scan/journal/index.php
2004
trans agenda: transsexual portraits. Source Photographic Review. Issue 39. Duncan, J. (ed.)
awards
2016 - 2021 (3-year award extended)
Philip Leverhulme Prize, The Leverhulme Trust
2021
My name is Sara
Four Corners Gallery exhibition
Association of Jewish Refugees
2021
My name is Sara
Four Corners Gallery exhibition
Cockayne – Grants for the Arts – London Community Foundation
2014 - 2019
LGBTQ Oral History Digital Collaboratory
Insight Grant from the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada.
Named collaborator on the award. P.I. Assoc. Prof Elspeth Brown, University of Toronto, Canada
2011
Wellcome Trust Small Grant
2007 - 2010
Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Fellowship in the Creative and Performing Arts
2010
Associate Project Award, Research Centre for Transnational Art, Identity and Nation (TrAIN), UAL
2009
AHRC Research Grant
British Council Overseas Conference Award
2006
Promising Researcher Fellowship, Wimbledon School of Art
2003 - 2005
AHRC Doctoral Award
2002 - 2003
University of the Arts London Doctoral Studentship
2001
AHRC Small Grant in the Creative and Performing Arts
1996
Development Fellowship, Association of Commonwealth Universities
1978 - 1980
Fulbright Hays Award, Fulbright Hays Commission
SELECTED conference papers
2018
Manfred and Susi: Kindertransport reverberations and aftershocks. British Jewish Contemporary Cultures: An International Conference, Bangor University.
In the Shadow of Rescue: The Afterlife of the Kindertransport. Guest Speaker, Cultural Memory Seminar, Columbia University, USA. Seminar co-presented with Prof Jack Halberstam.
2017
Keynote speech: Transgender and love in ‘Ken. To be destroye’d and collaborative photography. Mutual Conditionings of Gender and Love international conference, Aarhus University, Denmark.
Ken. To be destroyed. Reframing Family Photography international conference. University of Toronto, Canada.
Curating ‘Ken. To be destroyed’ 2014-2017. Co-authored paper with Val Williams. Researching, Writing, Exhibiting Photography, University of Westminster, London.
2016
Ken. To be destroyed: Photography, a transgender relative and a family archive. LGBTQ+ Archives, Libraries, Museums and Speciall Collections international conference, Bishopsgate Institute London.
2015
Photographs From a Family Archive - Through a Queer Lens at Fast Forward: Women in Photography - Then and Now conference, Tate Modern.
2014
Queering Trans* Archives, Panel Roundtable, Moving Trans* History Forward international conference, University of Victoria, Victoria B.C., Canada.
2012
Keynote speech: Re-imag(in)ing life-making, or queering the somatechnics of reproductive futurity. Co-authored with Queer theorist Assoc. Prof Nikki Sullivan, Macquarie University, Sydney. Given at ‘Somatechnical Figurations: Kinship, Bodies, Affects’ international conference, Södertörn University, Stockholm, Sweden.
2010
Queer Conceptions: Procreation Beyond Gender, given at Queer Again? Power, Politics and Ethics conference, Humboldt University, Berlin, Germany.
Private Selves and Public Appearances: Lived Experiences of Atypically Gendered Transsexual People. Appearance Matters 4 conference, University of the West of England, Bristol.
2009
Transcendent Genders: Private and Public Transsexual Experiences, (Re)Figuring Sex: Somatechnical (Re)Visions, The Fifth International Somatechnics Conference, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia.
In/visible Genders, given at Transgenders: New Identities and Visibilities international conference, Sorbonne Nouvelle, Paris-3, France.
2008
Trans Visions: The Experience of Photography and the Self- Visualisation of Transgender Embodiment conference, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver, Canada.
2007
Transpositions, Somatechnics conference, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia.
2006
transfiguration, FUTURE*QUEER conference, University College Dublin, Ireland.
2005
Seeing Beyond the Binary Divide, Body Modification Mark II conference, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia.
2004
The Reflected Image: A Photographic Collaboration with Transmen, InterseXions: Queer Visual Culture at the Crossroads conference, CLAGS, CUNY, N.Y., USA.
SELECTED artist talks
2021
In Conversation with Curator Katy Barron. Chaired by Monica Bohm- Duchen, Insiders Outsiders Festival
2019
Dark Works. Darkness international conference, Svalbard. Co- presented with Catherine Faulds.
2018
Reverberations and Aftershocks: Artistic Practice and an ITS case study. The Wiener Holocaust Library, London WC1B 5DP. Public talk given with Elise Bath, Wiener Library ITS Archivist.
2016
Ken. To be destroyed. London Alternative Photography Collective, Photofusion, London SW9 8LA.
2016
Ken. To be destroyed. Schwules Museum, Berlin.
2014
Ken. To be destroyed, Museum of Liverpool. Part of The Un-Straight Museum conference hosted by Homotopia.
2012
Trans*_Homo: of Lesbian Trans* Gays and Other Normalities. Schwules Museum, Berlin. With Jason Barker, research participant/subject of my photographs.
curating and editing
2017
Guest Curator of UAL PARC’s Moose on the Loose Research Biennale. Co-Curated with Val Williams. Events organised around themes from the Ken. To be destroyed project including exhibitions, talks, a one-day alternative photography symposium, film festival and photography workshops
2014
Queering Photography. Special Journal Issue of Photography and Culture. Vol. 7, issue 3. Special Issue Co-Editor with Elspeth Brown and Bruno Ceschel. Published by Bloomsbury
2011
finds 1. Exhibition curated for PARC, The Well Gallery, LCC, UAL
2008
Trans Lives: Presenting the (Extra) Ordinary. Exhibition Co-Curated with Simon Croft for the Transfabulous International Arts Festival, London. This exhibition was subsequently presented as a projection at The Trans Community Conference: Our Bodies, Our Minds, Our Environments, London
selected press
My name is Sara, Photomonitor, June 2022
An artist searching for traces of her family, Arolsen Archives News, 2022
An Artist Excavates Her Family’s Pre-Holocaust Story, Hyperallergic, September 14, 2021
Black and White Photography Magazine, 2021
Les drames de la Shoah racontes dans des photos faites de sang et de javel, Konbini, November 2021
Confronting the ongoing traumas of the Nazi terror, Morning Star, 2021
Interview with Robert Elms, Radio London, August 2021
Ken. To Be Destroyed – Sara Davidmann’s work at Belfast Exposed, Photomonitor, November 2017
The Photographer Rewriting Her Transgendered Family History, AnOther magazine, February 2017
Ken. To Be Destroyed: An Art Exhibit Exploring The Life Of A Transgender Woman In 1950s London, Huffington Post, January 2017
5 Queer Art Exhibitions to See This Spring in London, OUT, 2017
Sara Davidmann: Ken. To be destroyed, Lens Scratch, April 2016
One Artist’s Quest to Honor Her Transgender Uncle, New York Times, March 2016
A Family Reimagined, The New York Times, Sunday March 20, 2016
Es ware falsch, das zu verstecken, Die Zeitung, 17 March 2016
After 62 years, the heartbreaking story of Scotland's 'Danish Girl' finally comes to light, Herald Scotland, March 2016
Sara Davidmann über ihren Onkel Ken, ihre Fotoschau und ein Familienarchiv, Jüdische Allgemeine, March 2016
Die Zerstörung von Ken, Art in Berlin, March 2016
Ken. To be destroyed, book review, 1000 Words, June 2016
Unveiling a family secret, The International New York Times, July 2014
The artist who brought her uncle back to life as a woman, The Guardian, May 2014
My transgender uncle: A family secret hidden for decades, The Guardian, November 2013