Faculty and Staff

Photography Program Director
email: ssternbach@lagcc.cuny.edu

Courses taught: Beginning Photography, Intermediate Photography, Studio Lighting I & II, Digital Photography I & II, Photojournalism, View Camera

Bio: Scott Sternbach has been interested in photography since early childhood. His great grandfather and grandfather were both avid photographers and this fact most likely inspired him to begin taking photographs by the time he was 10 years old. Sternbach had a darkroom at 11 and had income in his early teens shooting slides of artwork for artists. After studying with Arnold Gassan at Ohio University he returned to New York and studied with Lisette Model at The New School for Social Research.

Over the course of the past 30 years, Sternbach's work has been published in The New York Times, Swiss Jazz Magazine, and New York Magazine, and has also been featured in 60 credits on CD and record jackets, and in numerous editorial spreads. His work has been exhibited nationally and internationally, including in the American Cultural Center, in Senegal, Dakar and in the permanent archive of Walt Disney Studios.

Sternbach has traveled extensively to document undiscovered places in Mexico, remote areas of the Yukon Territory, Alaska, Costa Rica and most recently, the Antarctic. He was awarded the prestigious National Science Foundation Antarctic Artists and Writers grant in May of 2008. The work produced from his 3 month residency in Antarctica is now in production and has been exhibited as 40 large format prints at LaGuardia College Atrium Gallery CUNY. Sternbach has presented the work in lecture format to the passengers on board the National Geographic Endeavour, for students at Yeshiva University, for CUNY faculty and a variety of local venues. Selections from the Antarctic project were included in “Finding Work” a group exhibition curated by Keith Miller at Gallatin Gallery (NYU) in November 2009. The Antarctic project was on exhibition at the American Museum of Natural History through January 2011 and has become part of a traveling exhibition that will last ten years. Sternbach has self-published a monograph of the work titled, "Antarctic Souls," and the book is available upon request.

Senior College Lab Technician, Adjunct Lecturer
email: jlarenas@lagcc.cuny.edu

 Courses taught: Beginning Photography, Intermediate Photography, Digital Photography I, Studio Lighting I, Studio Lighting II with view camera techinques, Color Photography, Color Darkroom Techniques, Commercial Photography Workshop, Commercial Photography Seminar, Internships, Independent Studies.

Bio: Javier Larenas, who obtained his Bachelors in Photography and Digital Imaging, is a Fine Art photographer with a lifelong love for photography and a great affinity for quality and detail. Influenced by photographers such as Ansel Adams, Jerry Uelsmann, Minor White, Imogen Cunningham, Margaret Bourke-White, Edward Weston, Eadweard Muybridge, Gordon Parks, Walker Evans, Ernst Haas, and Steve McCurry, his subjects are vast in scope and employ either artistic or editorial styles.

His work is recognized for its mastery of subtle color and tonal differences, lighting, composition, perspective, and attention to detail. Larenas is the only Tenured Faculty member whose dedication and commitment to photographic education now spans nearly two decades at LaGuardia. He has been involved in all facets of the program through the years, including, most recently, co-designing the current photo facility, which is the home of the LaGuardia Gallery of Photographic Arts. Although he is commonly known for teaching the Color Darkroom Techniques course, due to his extensive knowledge and experience he has also taught other advanced photography courses (see above). On a national level, he has been recognized with two teaching awards and has been nominated for Excellence in Photographic Teaching. He is also recognized in implementing innovative ideas that have given many students the opportunity to participate and work with Educational Volunteer Exchange Programs and Non-Profit organizations that involve photography.

Larenas' teaching philosophy is based on his passion to inspire students at an authentic and continuously challenging level. While cultivating and nurturing students' individual vision, he redefines their own levels of excellence and raises their technical expertise so as to empower creative expression. Effectiveness and success in this endeavor is based on a balance of critical thinking exercises, encouraged controlled experimentation, creative brainstorming sessions, and the refinement of craft. Ultimately, students supersede their initial expectations.

Finally, he has been a PSC CUNY Visual Arts Research Foundation Grant Recipient, PSC CUNY Research Visual Arts Award Program Panel Chairperson, member of LaGuardia’s Art and Exhibition Review Committee, and a Founding member of LaGuardia’s Commercial Photography Advisory Council.

Assistant Professor
email: smidkiff@lagcc.cuny.edu 

Courses taught: Beginning Photography, History of Photography, Digital Photography I, Digital Photography II

Bio: Sarah Midkiff has long been enamored with language and communication. Before settling in Queens, NY, she moved across the Midwest and east coast for a decade, during which time she studied studio art and photography at Notre Dame, RIT and Southern Illinois University. Though photography is her primary medium, her practices also include video, hand-drawn animation, installation, web design, and palm-sized bookmaking. Most recently exploring the production of gender, her work confronts the largely unconscious spaces in which reality and language construct each other. She is also fond of anachronistic combinations, wearing scarves, and drinking plenty of water.

Assistant Professor
email: hufernandez@lagcc.cuny.edu 

Courses taught: Beginning Photography, Commercial Photography Seminar, Introduction to Art, Urban Study-Art & Society

Bio: Hugo Fernandez was born in Miami, Florida. The son of Cuban exiles, he grew up in Florida and the North East. His interest in photography began with family snapshots and his sister’s own creative work. He began photographing in the early 80’s, getting his associates and bachelors in between traveling across the country and in Central and South America. He received his master’s from Yale in 1993, and began teaching at LaGuardia in 1994. Though predominantly a medium format landscape photographer, he has taught and worked with most cameras, studio equipment and processes. He’s slowly embracing digital and an enthusiast of LaGuardia’s ePortfolio program.

Adjunct Lecturer 

Courses taught: Beginning Photography, Alternative Photography, Studio Lighting I, Internships

Bio: Jay Corbett is a New York City based Commercial /Fine Art photographer who creates a world of exquisitely crafted still lifes. His assemblages have an elegant formality in which lighting, film, painting, digital enhancement and xerography all make contributions. Corbett received a B.F.A. from Rochester Institute of Technology in 1990. His work has been included in many shows and private collections: AGFA Photo Gallery, Communication Arts Award, Ernest Haas /Golden Light Awards, HOW Self Promotion Awards, Photo District News/Nikon Awards, PDN/PIX Digital Annual Awards, The E3 Gallery and The Visual Club Exhibition are just a few. Corbett has also been commissioned by such clients as Alitalia Airlines, AT&T, Camel, Dupont, Guinness, Charles Schwab, Eastman Kodak, Money Magazine, Omni Magazine, The Equitable, Turner Movie Classics and CIO Communications to create his unique form of imagery for them.

Adjunct Lecturer 

 Courses taught: Beginning Photography, Commercial Photography Workshop, Commercial Photography Seminar

Bio: Tim Dalal earned a B.F.A. In Photography in 1982 from SUNY New Paltz. He moved to New York City and began his career working as a photo assistant, a staff photographer and eventually opening his own studio specializing in product still life. He has been teaching at LaGuardia Community College since 2008.

Adjunct Assistant Professor  

Courses taught: Beginning Photography

Bio: Maureen Drennan is a photographer born and based in New York City. She began her photographic studies at LaGuardia Community College and then went on to complete an MFA in photography at the School of Visual Arts in 2009. She has been featured in group exhibitions nationally and locally. Maureen has received honors from Aperture, The Photo Review, PDN, The Photographic Resource Center of Boston, and Artist as Citizen. Her ice-fishing project was featured on the New York Times Dot Earth blog in September 2009.

Adjunct Assistant Professor  

Courses taught: Beginning Photography, History of Photography

Bio: Jaimie Lyle Gordon is a fine art photographer, and has exhibited and published her photographs since the early 1980’s. She has a BFA in Photography from School of Visual Arts, NYC, and an MFA in Fine Art Photography from Hunter College, NYC. Jaimie’s pioneering use of montage and projection techniques, and her photographic exploration into the relationship between memory, melancholy, myth, and the feminine imagination puts her in the vanguard of Post Modern Photographers working with Surrealist methods. Through her many years of teaching photography, Jaimie has cultivated her observations into a unique classroom experience that combines traditional structure with a creative and experimental approach to learning and communication. She enjoys sharing her enthusiasm and knowledge for making and understanding photographs with her students, and is deeply committed to helping them believe in themselves and reach their individual potential.

Adjunct Lecturer 

Courses taught: Beginning Photography

Bio: Fascinated at an early age by the photographic medium and its ability to either document the world or transform it into a new representation, Thierry Gourjon, a French born photographer with family ties to both Iceland and Norway, first studied medicine for two years, after getting his French Baccalaureat in Paris. Frustrated by the lack of creativity associated with the study of medicine he decided to go back to his early interest, photography. Having been self taught up to that point but wanting to further his understanding of the basic principles of photography, he enrolled at the Societe Francaise de Photography and got his CAP de Photographie a year later. Unhappy with the limited options available in France to further his studies and somewhat put off by the rigidity of French culture, he decided to send his portfolio to the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, NY, where he was accepted early 1993. Three years later he graduated with a B.FA. in Photography. Freelance photographer and Photo instructor for the past 15 years, he has been able to combine working as a commercial and documentary photographer as well as developing long-term personal projects.

Adjunct Lecturer 

Courses taught: Beginning Photography, Intermediate Photography

Bio: Sally Boon Matthews has a Foundation Degree in Art and a Diploma in Art and Design (Photography) both from The Arts University at Bournemouth, UK, with further studies in history and philosophy at Boston University, Mass. Her practice incorporates photography, drawing, painting and video to explore the transformation of personal histories by re-contextualizing memories.

Adjunct Assistant Professor  

Courses taught: Beginning Photography, Commercial Photography Workshop, Commercial Photography Seminar

Bio: Education: BFA, Philadelphia College of Art; MA, New York University/ICP

One-person exhibitions include: Dry Goods Art Gallery, Livingston Manor, NY; White Columns; Baird Center, South Orange, NJ, New York University, 80 Washington Square Gallery, NY

Group exhibitions include: University of the Arts, Philadelphia, Ricco/Maresca Gallery; Queens Museum of Art; Athens Institute of Contemporary Art, GA; Von Lintel & Nusser Gallery; Silverstein Gallery; Williamsburg Art and Cultural Center; Richard Anderson Fine Arts; Minnesota Center for Photography, Minneapolis

Publications include: The New Yorker, The Village Voice, Williamsburg Weekly, Art Papers, Flash Art, Open City

Awards include: New York Foundation for the Arts Grant; Yaddo Fellowship; residency, Chinati Foundation; PS122.

Adjunct Assistant Professor 

Courses taught: Digital Photography I & II

Bio: I have been a Staff Photographer at the Museum of Modern Art for 12 years, received my MFA from Ohio University, and employ digital photographic techniques in my artmaking. Digital photography provides the possibility to refine and construct images. Taking a cue from traditional photography I try to start with the best possible image. I then have a choice of refining a portrait, for example, or constructing a landscape from several others; a collage. I work primarily with a 35mm DSLR because of its flexibility. As a professional photographer I have developed a thorough technical understanding of Photography and Adobe Photoshop. I am here at Laguardia to pass on my learning experiences and techniques to all who are interested.

Adjunct College Lab Technician 

Bio: After a promising career in Finance in St. Petersburg, Russia, Lidiya Kan decided to pursue her long love and passion for photography. In 2004, she began her quest, moved to New York City and has not looked back since. She is now a graduate of the Commercial Photography program at LaGuardia and has been an adjunct lab technician at LaGuardia for 6 years. She has expanded her professional photographic experience working with institutions such as the Philippe Halsman Archives and the LaGuardia and Wagner Archives on photo-documentary collections and projects, and with photographers such as Livia Corona.

Photographing in an editorial and documentary style, Lidiya is inspired by masters of photography such as Sebastiåo Salgado and Eugéne Atget. Known to work on a long term project, she is currently working on documentary project about Uzbekistan.