Artist's Background

Daniel W. Coburn was born in San Bernardino, California in 1976. His work and research investigates the family photo album as one component of a visual infrastructure that supports the flawed ideology of the American Dream.

Coburn's family members confront his camera to construct a potent amendment to the idealized family album.  He photographs his loved ones in parables of love, reverie, respect, and quiet tragedy to openly address a dark family narrative. His photographs are designed to illuminate important issues that are often suppressed in traditional family albums.

Coburn's prints are held in collections at major institutions including the Museum of Contemporary Photography at Columbia College, The Marianna Kistler Beach Museum of Art, and the University of New Mexico Art Museum.  His photographs have been the subject of solo exhibitions at the Mulvane Art Museum, Silver Eye Center for Photography, Filter Photo Space and La Fototeca Gallery.  His work has appeared in numerous international group exhibitions including Álbum de Família at Centro Municipal de Arte Hélio Oiticica, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. His first monograph, The Hereditary Estate, was published by Kehrer Verlag in 2015. Daniel is a recipient of a 2017 John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship.  He was named as a finalist for the Arnold Newman Prize for New Directions in Photographic Portraiture the same year. Coburn received his MFA with distinction from the University of New Mexico in 2013. He currently serves as Assistant Professor of Photo Media at the University of Kansas.