On view: September 20 – October 26, 2025
“For me, childhood roaming was what developed self-reliance, a sense of direction and adventure,
imagination, a will to explore, to be able to get a little lost and then figure the way back.” Rebecca
Solnit, A Field Guide to Getting Lost
Sometimes we find ourselves lost. Or maybe we get lost on purpose. In the past five years or so I’ve had the
feeling that I was lost. In various aspects of my life, I felt very unsure of my choices, perhaps doubtful of the map
I felt I had been following. I worried about whether I was too far astray of a path I had previously been following
to ever find it again. It scared me.
I recalled that when I was young, I would set out into the woods, with no map at all, looking for new pathways,
new adventure. I had the confidence that I would find my way – to return or go onward. My friends and I would
occasionally plan expeditions, maybe “camping out” for the night. This would include packing of gear as if we
were exploring a frontier. That frontier might only be a nearby forest, but to us it was wilderness to be traversed
and conquered. Were we searching for adventure, or just to be independent? We wanted to be scouts, like
Lewis and Clark. We wanted to venture out from the parentally minded homes, and enter a land with less
guarantee of safety and more chance of discovery. We wanted to prove to ourselves we could survive it. Maybe
we would find a new home in the wilds and never return to civilization.
This new series of semi-narrative tableaus imagines a band of young explorers traversing the land. These young
women portray both the fantasy of those childhood expeditions and serve to illustrate the idea of getting lost,
being lost, and finding one’s way. This is not a specific story being told with a point-by-point plot, but a series of
scenarios with repeating characters and tropes. The land they roam is a non-specific midwestern farmscape,
both wild and cultivated, seen in a half-light of evening or gathering storms. The relationships between these
wanderers shifts with the landscape and is often deliberately ambiguous. I intend to depict them just on the
edge of reality, verging slightly into the cinematic, in hopes the viewer will indulge in the same idealistic vision
and suspend disbelief.
Solnit goes on to say, “Getting lost like that seems like the beginning of finding your way or finding another
way, though there are other ways of being lost.” This series is in some ways my own processing of being lost and
finding my way, and gaining an appreciation of getting lost as a deliberate act.
Christopher Schneberger is a Chicago-based photographer, educator, and curator. Exhibitions of his photography include: Annenberg Space for Photography in Los Angeles; Dorsky Projects in New York City; Geocarto International in Hong Kong; and Blank Wall Gallery in Athens. His work is in the collections of: The Art Institute of Chicago; the Taubman Museum of Art in Roanoke, Virginia; and the Mary and Leigh Block Museum in Evanston, Illinois. He is Assistant Professor of photography and Gallery Director at Vincennes University. He has taught at The School of the Art Institute, and Columbia College Chicago. He has curated numerous exhibitions of photography at the Shircliff Gallery of Art, the Giertz Gallery, and Perspective Gallery, including Heirloom, Bending the Truth, Realms, This Particular Patch, and Re:Place. He has been a presenter at the Society for Photographic Education’s Midwest and Southeast conferences, and has been a visiting artist at Iowa State University, Indiana University, Kendall College of Art, and Western Michigan University. He received his BFA in Creative Photography from the University of Florida, and received his MFA in Photography at Indiana University.
GALLERY HOURS & VISITOR INFORMATION
This exhibition will be held in the Second Floor Atruim Gallery of the Evanston Art Center (EAC). Masks are optional but strongly recommended for students, visitors and staff.
Gallery Hours
Monday–Thursday: 9am–6pm
Friday: 9am–5pm
Saturday–Sunday: 9am–4pm
HOW TO PURCHASE ARTWORK
Artwork sale proceeds benefit both the artist and the Evanston Art Center. If you are interested in purchasing artwork on display, please contact Emma Rose Gudewicz, Director of Development and Exhibition Manager, at [email protected] or (847) 475-5300 x 102.
This program is partially supported by a grant from the Illinois Arts Council through federal funds provided by the National Endowment for the Arts.
Image Credits: Christopher Scneberger, The Wanderers 9.