Carol McCusker - Ashley Blalock

Carol McCusker, Phd.: Curator of Photography, Museum of Photographic Arts, San Diego

Carol McCusker earned a B.F.A. in Fiber Art and Art History from Massachusetts College of Art/Boston, then her Masters and Ph.D. in Art History with an emphasis on Photography at the University of New Mexico/Albuquerque. She has been Curator at the Museum of Photographic Arts/San Diego for eight years. In the past decade, she has had the pleasure of curating over 40 exhibitions at UNM and MoPA, and has written essays for numerous books and magazines. McCusker is committed to this community's artistic growth, education, and support of artists both local and international. She says, "Choosing Ashley Blalock for my portrait blends my former life as a fiber artist with my curatorial work in photography. She has brilliantly conceptualized a portrait through the materials of linen and light."

What is your vision of the future of the Visual arts for San Diego?

"My job is to give people ways of thinking about art. This is a collaborative act between the artist, the viewer, and me. It is how art gathers meaning. As a curator, I look for what artists are trying to say, what their work reveals about society, and the timeless conditions of being human. In a new economy, I hope more power is given back to art and artists, and less to the marketplace. Toward this end, I will support raves, happenings, performances, and acts of conscience and outrage in San Diego's future so that art becomes essential, once again, to our way of understanding ourselves, and that indefinable, joyous aspect of being alive to the world and what is often left unspoken."