Collette V. Fournier Biography
Collette V. Fournier has an MFA in Visual Arts from Vermont College and a BS from RIT in Communications and Photographic Illustration. Born in Harlem, she grew up in Brooklyn and Queens, NY. She is the staff photographer emeritus from Rockland Community College and continues to adjunct in the Photography Department.
Fournier has worked as a staff photographer for The Rockland Journal-News, The Bergen Record, about...time magazine, and freelanced for The New York Post. Earlier in her career she worked in television as a production assistant and engineer trainee. Fournier was selected by the University of Rochester to photograph three educational tours to Senegal, West Africa and Mali and more recently has traveled to Ghana, Togo and Benin with Chiku Awali African Dance, Drum and Culture. Fournier also operates her photography business Collette Fournier Photography and Production providing weddings, family portraits, documentation, stock photography, tabletop photography books, magazines, freelancing and commercial services.
Fournier curated several exhibitions including a multi-sited exhibition “There is a World Through Our Eyes: Perceptions and Visions of the African American Photographer” exhibited at Rockland Community College, ACOR, Arts Alliance of Haverstraw, Rockland Center for the Arts and Blue Hill in 1993. Fournier has had fourteen one-woman exhibitions and participated in over forty group exhibitions.
Fournier is an active member of Kamoinge Inc., an African-American
photography collective, Timeless was published to celebrate the Collective’s 50th
year. As a Soros fellow (OSI), she documented Post Hurricane Katrina. Through Atria Books, Kamoinge published Sweet Breath of Life, A poetic narrative of the African American family by Kamoinge photographer Frank Stewart with writer Ntozake Shange. Fournier’s work is published in textbooks and she is completing a personal narrative on her journey through photography.
Fournier is a member of Society for Photographic Education (SPE) and was honored by AAUW for her photography. She received the Artist of Year Award by the County Executive Arts Awards and Arts Council. She shares her photography “Retrospective Series: Spirit of a People” with the global community. Fournier has been Artist-in-Residence at the CEJJES Institute in Pomona, NY. and is on the board to develop The Gordon Black Cultural Arts Center. Her photography archives can also be seen in the Social Documentary Network (SDN).
Earlier in her career Fournier was selected by the Rochester City School District and the University of Rochester to photograph three educational tours to West Africa. From that expedition she produced an audio-visual presentation “Faces and Places of West Africa” presented at SPE (Society of Photographic Education), in Buffalo, NY and Honoring African Cultural Continuity in Film/Photography produced by Brooklyn Demme.
Fournier’s photography work is collected in Photography Collections Preservation Project (PCCP), Finkelstein Memorial Library, Brooklyn Museum of Art, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Smithsonian Institute, WDC, Women International Archive, CA. and in private collections. She enjoys many years of service to her community and learning African Culture with Chiku Awali as a dancer and drummer.
StatementHaving worked in the television and print industry, I'm now doing documentary and fine art photography.
CvCOLLETTE V. FOURNIER
Education:
Vermont College, Montpelier, VT. MFA Visual Arts
Rochester Institute of Technology; BS Biomed Communications; AAS, Photo Illustration
Experience:
Adjunct, Humanities Department, Art Department current
Rockland Community College Suffern, NY 1992 – current
Campus Communications/Photographer 1994 – 2016;
Staff Photographer / Freelance Photographer
The (Rockland) Journal News, W. Nyack, NY
Bergen Record, Hackensack, NJ; Staff Photographer
Staff Photographer, about…time magazine Rochester, NY
Solo Exhibitions:
Mercer County Community College Pop-Up on “The Photo
Live Show” at JKC Gallery
“Retrospective: Spirit of A People” October 2022
Maine Media Workshop Series with Kamoinge Photographer
Collette Fournier moderated by Kamoinge’s Lola Flash
“Retrospective: Spirit of A People”; September 2022
"See, Observe, Think, Reflect, Internalize": Photography by
Collette V. Fournier; Opening Reception on Saturday, April 2,
2022; On view through June 11, 2022 in Gallery One and
Gallery Two, Rockland Center for the Arts (RoCA)
27 So. Greenbush Rd. W. Nyack, NY 10994; (Grant)
Info: 845-358-0877; www.rocklandartcenter.org
"In Search of My African Roots" - A Virtual Talk with
Photographer Collette V. Fournier;
“Queen Mother of Progress and African Journeys”; Garner
Arts Festival Building 35; May (Grant) Social Documentary Network:“Queen Mother of Progress” https://www.socialdocumentary....
5850 Garnerartscenter.org
Nyack’s News and Views.
http://www.nyacknewsandviews.c...
Social Documentary Network:“Queen Mother of Progress” https://www.socialdocumentary....
From Tulsa to Minneapolis: Photographing the Long Road to
Justice; Social Documentary Network and Zeke Magazine
Photoville Fence 9th Edition Fournier: "Ripple of Thunder: A History of Black Motorcyclists" https://photoville.com/.../fen...
StateNY
CountryUnited States
