Lori Nix is an American artist known for her dystopian miniature dioramas depicting humanity's demise that she constructs herself in her Brooklyn apartment. She credits her interest in natural disasters and destroyed societies to growing up in Kansas in the 1970s and watching related disaster films. Nix uses film and foam to recreate scenarios from her imagination, spending up to seven months on a single photo shoot, from initial concept to final print. Her work is inspired by 19th century American landscape paintings like the Hudson River School and aims to make viewers question what they are seeing and feel the failing future of humanity.

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Michael Palachuk
Mid-term Lori Nix
K. Pennington Art 240
Lori Nix is an American artist who loves using the two mediums, film and foam, to get her artistic
point of view across. She is the creator of these images, the sets, the lighting, and almost everything in
the frame. Common themes in her art revolve around humanities demise and their soon failing future,
so while it may be easy for some people to go find pictures of this, around the world, Lori likes to
recreate her thoughts from scratch in the front room of her Brooklyn apartment using dioramas that she
fully constructs and her 8x10 film camera.
Growing up in Kansas in the 70’s helped make natural disasters iconic imagery for Lori. She also
credits all the disaster movies that were coming out during her childhood for her heavy use of a
dystopian future setting and destroyed societies. Lori started working with photography in college, at
Truman University, as the News darkroom printer. It quickly went from being the printer to the editor,
which was a change that made Lori decide she didn’t like having to go find the shot she would rather
just make it. Her first diorama came about when she was going to shoot her hometown for her final
project. Instead of having to go all the way home she built a background fitting for Kansas and buildings
to match. This became her first diorama picture “Accidently Kansas”.
That work finished up her time at Truman University; she received her BFA in 1993, followed by
her Masters from Ohio University two years later. In 1995 she had a fellowship at the American
photography institute, which brought her artwork more attention and helped bring in grants to fund
more of her art. Lori gives credit for her photos, not only to her childhood stomping grounds and the
disaster movies but to the art she learned about in college. The Hudson River School, an American art
school of the mid-19th century, is one of her biggest inspirations for the set up and over all look of her
backgrounds and the scenes set before them. While she is creative and builds, paints and sets up 99% of

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these shots, her partner comes in at the end and helps distress everything with paint and dirt and gold
flaking to bring out the feel Lori gets from those Hudson school paintings.
All of her photos are set up for that one point of view we see. She sets up her camera, then
builds the set around it and moves any lighting or set pieces in the frame off of where the camera is.
One whole photo shoot will take anywhere from five to seven months and two to three weeks of that
will be the actual photography part of it. The whole project starts with her coming up with ideas, usually
on her daily ride into town on the train. Then filtering through the ideas to which ones will work now
and which ones will take longer and so on. Once she has an Idea she can work with she will start wil
reference books and with the point of view and the framing, then she will start to fill up more of that
frame with objects and actions. Then she builds then moves, then builds, then movies again. Seven
months later she clicks off a few photos on her 8x10 film camera, makes sure it’s what she wants, and
then she processes her own film and prints the pictures herself. The pictures are usually printed large,
48x65, and once the picture is what she wants she will recycle the set for the next photo shoot.
Lori is working with film, and while she can still mess with things in the darkroom, she chooses
to leave everything just the way it was when she took the photo. She likes the corkness of the colors
being too bright or the disproportions of something’s, its part of what makes it art for her. While allot of
her work is translated into digital for books and websites, she never digitally enhances the pictures.
While she likes lying to the viewer and makes them question what they are looking at for a second, she
wants them to know that everything they see is exactly what it is and exactly where it’s supposed to be.
Lori Nix wants you to feel like you’re watching the failing future of man; she wants the picture to
feel like Gods hand in nature and man’s aw over it. She says “I am afraid of what the future holds if we
do not change our ways regarding the climate, but at the same time I am fascinated by what a changing
world can bring”. Lori is still doing the same artwork and lately she has been working on these “one

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week” black and white projects titled “Natural Musuem”, and while she says color film has some feel of
fantasy like “Wizard of Oz” this black and white series is a relaxing and fun break for her.
Lori Nix interviewed CoolHunting 2008 ep. #79, 2/28/14
Lori Nix interviewed by MadMuseum 2010, 2/28/14
Lori Nix, Accidently Kansas 1993-2000, The City 2008 Unnatural History 2013. Brooklyn NY lorinix.net 2/28/14
Lori Nix, ArtSpace, 2012 Print Magazine 2/28/14
HudsonRiverSchool Artists Trails 2010 2/28/14