[bio]

As a visual artist, Roberta Fineberg (RF) focuses on the themes of serendipity, inventiveness, and the development of ideas for her photography, video, installations, works on paper, and painting. Drawn to experimentation, she explores diverse mediums and concepts such as the ephemeral (Butterfly Series), stolen moments (documentary photography), play, timelessness, the enduring, and the significance of matter.

In 2023, RF created an interactive installation, works on paper on the female body, in a public space. In July 2022, RF’s Double Helix was included in a Sotheby’s auction in New York City and exhibited in the preview show Contemporary Discoveries. Selected exhibitions include Sojourner Gallery New York (2022), Phyllis Harriman Gallery New York studio shows (2020, 2022), CADAF online art fair (2020), Gallery122 New York pop-up group show (2018), Curate NY online group show (2013), Paris Photo: Photos, Femmes, Feminisme group show (2010). Fineberg’s photography is in private and public collections, including portraits of women writers at the Bibliothèque Nationale and Bibliothèque Marguerite Durand in Paris, France. She was awarded 15 laurels (2020-2023) from independent film festivals worldwide for her experimental video, You Will Never Beat New York (2020). 

Backstory:

RF was an editorial photographer while studying in Paris. In France she contributed both photography and writing to publications, landing a column (photos and text) with The Saturday Review. Later, her freelance photography appeared in numerous publications, including American Girl, Le Monde, Jeune Afrique, Paris Match, L’Officiel Femme, Ms, Weltwoche, Vanguardia, among others with images also licensed through stock agencies. Her photographs were selected for cover art at W.W. Norton, St. Martin’s Press, Harcourt, Bookspan, Simon & Schuster, etc. In 1997 Macmillan published City Riders: A Story of Riding and Friendship a story with black-and-white photographs by RF on three teenage girls who rode horses in the 1990s at the oldest horse stable in New York City, Claremont Riding Academy. In New York (2003) Print Regional Design Annual awarded RF for book jacket photography for If Wishes Were Horses.