Jess T. Dugan

Jess T. Dugan (United States, b. 1986)

Candles, 2020

Archival Pigment Print

10.5 × 14 inch image on 16 × 20 inch paper

Signed edition of 30

Jess T. Dugan is interested in representations of identity, particularly as they apply to LGBTQ communities. This image is from their Family Pictures series, for which Dugan presents pictures of their own family to speak to multigenerational, queer family visibility. The full body of work captures an array of significant everyday scenes, such as this still life of two candles within the home.

Jess T. Dugan received their MFA in Photography from Columbia College Chicago and a Masters in Liberal Studies at Harvard University. Their work has been widely exhibited internationally and is in the permanent collections of over 50 museums. Dugan’s monographs include Look at me like you love me (MACK, 2022), To Survive on This Shore: Photographs and Interviews with Transgender and Gender Nonconforming Older Adults (Kehrer Verlag, 2018) and Every Breath We Drew (Daylight Books, 2015). They are the recipient of a Pollock-Krasner Foundation Grant, an ICP Infinity Award, and were selected by the Obama White House as an LGBT Artist Champion of Change. Dugan’s work was featured in the exhibition LOVE: Still Not the Lesser at MoCP in 2023.