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Join Geoff Bluh for receptions for "Positively Deerfield Street":opening reception: Saturday, Feb. 7, 11am-2pm
closing reception: Friday, Feb. 27, 5-8pm
Artist’s Statement
This exhibit explores the Deerfield Street neighborhood of Greenfield, MA. Owning a small piece of this neighborhood and calling it home for 30+ years has allowed me to document in photographs the small and larger transformations that occur slowly over time.
These new photographs made from 2024-2025 are an observation of how change happens here on a daily and seasonal basis, right before my eyes — and lens. At their heart these images are about visual curiosities and a quirkiness that I encounter in my “backyard.”
I have walked in this neighborhood on daily photo shoots, seeing basically the same sights — yet the elements that make Deerfield Street what it is, are in constant flux due to changing seasons and human intervention.
My environment at times feels static, other times dynamic. It is a place where human hands and natural forces are always at work — constructing and deconstructing.
These images reflect my personal history with Deerfield Street. One that spans as far back as 1980 — the year I began studying photography at Greenfield Community College, living in an apartment on Deerfield Street.
From the late 1980s to the early 1990s, I intentionally documented Deerfield Street and the former Greenfield Tap & Die Factory in its crumbling glory. This became a body of black and white images that I exhibited locally.
Images included views of the Greenfield Tap & Die, its smoke stack, and the street with its “brutalist“ concrete wall — which not only spanned a long stretch of Deerfield Street, but blocked the view of the Green River from the street and sidewalk.
Also of interest were the rows of dilapidated factory houses that lined Deerfield street, appearing to be built on top of each other. They were occupied by a colorful cast of characters: artists, the working class, and immigrants — some from Russia, Eastern Europe, and Laos who found good work in factories, and a place to raise families.
The year is now 2026, and time has erased much of what was Deerfield Street.
I have returned to this project as an older photographer who has learned new tricks — digital and color. These photographs are as much about my own transformation as they are about their subject.
Artist’s Biography
Geoffrey Bluh has been a photographer for over 40 years, both professionally and for personal projects. He was raised in Conway, Massachusetts and attended local public schools, Greenfield Community College and the University of Massachusetts. His education in photography began at GCC but has become a life-long informal study. He is active in various photographic organizations and groups including the Vermont Center for Photography.
Geoff worked at the Greenfield Recorder as one of the staff as well as freelance photographers for many years which has contributed to a lasting and deep relationship to the area where he grew up and still resides.
Geoff’s professional photography work for many years was done in the darkroom where he produced exhibition prints for other artists and organizations. Today he is still using the darkroom primarily for film processing for himself and clients.
Earlier bodies of Geoff’s work includes portfolios of large format black and white landscape images, documentary images of Greenfield’s old factory neighborhoods, among other subjects including portraits.
He has exhibited photographs at Greenfield Community College, ZONE Art Center, GCTV, Artspace, Forbes Library, McCusker’s Market, Vermont Center for Photography, Salmon Falls Gallery, as well as donations to many auctions and fundraisers.
Click here for information on the exhibit—> https://thelavacenter.org/exhibits/geoff-bluh/
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Event Venue & Nearby Stays
324 Main St, Greenfield, MA, United States, Massachusetts 01301
Concerts, fests, parties, meetups - all the happenings, one place.
