McKenzie, Rosita

About the artist

Name

McKenzie, Rosita

Biography

Rosita McKenzie began her life's work as a specialist in visual art and visual disability in the early 1980s. Working with major UK galleries and museums, she has been instrumental in changing attitudes towards visually disabled participation in the visual arts. In 2006, she was invited by Inverleith House, Royal Botanic Garden, Edinburgh to create her first photographic exhibition: `Two Voices' and her career as a blind photographer was born.

"I use digital photography and inclusive interpretation techniques to make the visual world visible to visually disabled people. I also aim to bring the world of the blind person's imagination into the open for sighted people to see.By its very nature, my artwork challenges traditional photographic practice and portraiture in that subjects are not expected to gaze into the camera lens. Instead, with Edinburgh People, my intension was to capture the natural and `pure' essence of each subject, not an artificial image, created by a contrived pose or special lighting." (Rosita McKenzie, 2010)

Significantly, McKenzie is not only building her own international reputation as a practicing artist but with the establishment of her Revealed Photographic Group, Edinburgh, 2009, she encourages the artwork of other visually disabled photographers and the artists who support them.

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