Séance: Pensacola Museum of Art Debuts Supernatural Exhibit for Fall 2022

SÉANCE

Pensacola Museum of Art Debuts Supernatural Exhibit for Fall 2022

Courtesy of the Pensacola Museum of Art

For those that find haunted houses too gauche and feel a bit too old to go trick or treating, the Pensacola Museum of Art will be hosting a supernatural exhibit this fall which provides a glimpse into reallife attempts to communicate with the dead.

Table-tipping workshop with mediums Reverend Jane and Chris Howarth. Erie, Pennsylvania, 2014 32” x 48”

The photography exhibit, Séance, showcases the work of Shannon Taggert and her explorations into

Spiritualist practices across the

United States, England and France from the last 20 years. The exhibition examines the relationship of Spiritualism to human celebrity, its connections to art, science and technology and its intrinsic bond with the medium of photography.

Spiritualism is an American-born religion that believes in communication with spirits of the dead. The movement emerged in Rochester, New York in 1848 when two adolescent sisters, Kate and Margaret Fox, claimed to communicate with the spirit of a murdered man through a system of coded knocks. This phenomenon drew large crowds eager to witness the girls serve as ‘mediums’ of communication with the deceased. As the religion grew, several Spiritualist schools and communities formed that still operate today, of which Lily Dale, founded in Western New York in 1879, remains the most popular.

Shannon Taggart was first introduced to the religion as a teenager, when her cousin received a message from a medium at Lily Dale revealing a strange family secret. The incident made Taggart deeply curious about Spiritualism, leading her first to photograph the Lily Dale community in 2001 and eventually to document other Spiritualist centers, including Arthur Findlay College in the United Kingdom and Montcabirol in France. strange to some viewers, Spiritualism and photography have many similarities. Having both developed in the mid-nineteenth century, the religion and the art form provided a new method for convincing the audience that things are not always as they seem.

When Spiritualists began using photography to document their work, the religion seized on the new medium as a tool for revealing the existence of spirits. For non-believers, the ghostly forms that materialized in spirit photographs proved nothing more than darkroom trickery.

While this double-sided coin of belief and skepticism haunts the histories of both photography and Spiritualism, Taggart’s photographs do not take sides. As seen in many of the exhibit photos on display in Séance, her photos often include unexplained phenomena including glowing orbs, out-ofplace light flares and visual blurs which invoke the feeling of otherworldly entities. Taking on the role of participant observer, Taggart bears witness with her camera to an unseen world of belief lying just beyond the fringes of everyday reality.

“Over the years, I’ve encountered an array of photographic séance phenomena,” Taggart said in her book. “These artifacts made me consider the analogies found at the intersection of life, death, Spiritualism and photography. Photography and Spiritualism both offer an interaction with what was once present, but is now gone. Each uses the term ‘medium’ to describe their ☞

role as an intermediary instrument for communication. Trance states often develop under a red light, like the latent images brought forth in the fluid of chemical darkrooms. Ectoplasm is described as moist and fragrant, like human emissions, and light-sensitive, like photographic materials. Wombs, cameras and séance rooms are all devices that generate and transmit presence from inside a dark chamber.”

Shannon Taggart is an artist and author based in St. Paul, Minnesota. Her photographs have been exhibited and featured internationally, including within the publications TIME, New York Times Magazine, Discover, and Newsweek. Her work has been recognized by Nikon, Magnum Photos and the Inge Morath Foundation, American Photography and the Alexia Foundation for World Peace. Taggart’s monograph, SÉANCE (Fulgur Press, 2019) was listed as one of TIME magazine’s ‘Best Photobooks of 2019.’

Séance: Photographs by Shannon Taggert will be on view on the first floor of the Pensacola Museum of Art from September 16 to December 4, 2022. The exhibition was organized in collaboration with the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.

a Table-tipping workshop with mediums Reverend Jane and

Chris Howarth.

Erie, Pennsylvania, 2014 32” x 48”

a Medium Kai Muegge displays ectoplasm filled with images of the dead.

Basel Psi Association,

Switzerland, 2018 30” x 20”

_ Reverend Jean heals Jennifer, the Healing Temple.

Lily Dale, NY, 2003 20” x 30”

The Pensacola Museum of Art, in partnership with the UWF College of Arts, Social Sciences and the Humanities will also be hosting an event with Shannon Taggart on September 30. The artist talk begins at 6:30 pm with a book signing to follow. PMA members are invited to a members only preview at 5:30 pm before the public reception begins at 6 pm. The Pensacola Museum of Art is located at 407 S Jefferson Street in downtown Pensacola.The museum is open Tuesday through Saturday from 10 am to 4 pm, and on Sundays from 12 pm to 4 pm. To learn more about Séance: Photographs by Shannon Taggert, register for the Artist Talk or explore more of the exhibitions at the PMA, head to PensacolaMuseum.org.