Jonathan Kline, long-time photography professor at Bennington College, is retiring after the Spring 2024 term and 27 years of teaching. We sit down in the photography classroom to discuss his time at the college, his favorite classes to teach, and what his plans are for the coming years.
How long have you been working at Bennington?
I started as a visiting faculty member in the fall of 1997. I came up here from NYU on Fridays and had a class just one day and then would drive back to New York that night. That was my first time as a visiting faculty member and then they offered me a full -time position starting the following fall of 1998. I’ve been full-time since.
Wow. So it’s been 27 years?
Quite a few. The fellow that I replaced, who had retired, had been here for 26 years and his name was Neil Rappaport. He had so many loyal students over the 26 years that he taught here. It was interesting to come in and fill those shoes and redirect the department, make changes, but also to work with other faculty members.
What has your favorite class been to teach? Either recurring or one-off classes?
Hands down it’s got to be 100 Experiments. I love that class. Everybody’s just rolling up their sleeves and trying things, taking risks, and not being overly concerned about final perfection. It’s just getting familiar with the wide range of things that photography offers. Being physical with it and not just sitting in a chair, in front of a screen, but to engage all three centuries, 19th, 20th, and 21st in that exploration. It’s been the most exciting, rewarding part of teaching.
When did you first teach 100 Experiments?
Experiments have always been part of my teaching from the get-go, but the course formalized in our curriculum probably didn’t start until maybe 2015 or 16.
How would you summarize your time at Bennington?
Over the years it’s shifted and changed. You’re a much different person in your 40s than you are when you’re just at the cusp of 70. I would say Bennington has been most exciting for me over the decades because it’s always asked us to teach what we love, as opposed to say, you know, NYU, which I’m very loyal to, we were pretty much told what we were to teach. Whereas Bennington, it’s much more open to determine the content of your classes. If I’m into something and I’m excited by it and can bring it into a classroom, that’s going to make it more rewarding. Instead of teaching the same old, same old that your department head is telling you “That’s your niche, that’s your specialty, that’s what you have to teach.” As they often do at more hierarchical institutions.
What did you want to instill into photography students at Bennington?
Just a love for the physical. The idea that photography is deeply rooted in being in the world, looking, and then in the dark room making and being part of the process. Whether it’s objects or images, it’s just that level of physicality. It’s not just something that becomes reduced down to a simple gesture of an automatic digital sensor taking a very good photograph and then just putting it through the post -production work of Lightroom or Photoshop. I don’t find that to be as engaging as other ways of working. Where it’s more of a hybrid of digital and analog, and physical, and what’s available with digital, which is pretty amazing, but it’s not the whole end of the game.
What are you planning on doing next, creative or personally?
Well, I’m stopping teaching here at Bennington, but I’m not stopping working. I just finished up a collaborative project in South America with two collaborators in Chile and Ecuador. And then looking forward to working with a collaborator in Japan this fall on a paper negative project. Also the background is, I have got two young kids, so I am really interested in being a dad, and swim lessons and soccer and skiing lessons and all that stuff.
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