R. J. Kern

R. J. Kern (born 1978) is an American artist, known for his photographs exploring identity, culture, and philosophical questions about nature and heritage through the interaction of people, animals and landscape. His work has been exhibited throughout the United States and in Canada, China, England, Finland, Georgia, Germany, Japan and Norway, at venues including the National Portrait Gallery, London, Rourke Art Museum, Museum of Modern Art Tbilisi, and Yixian International Photography Festival (Anhui, China) among many. Kern has received awards and recognition from the Taylor Wessing Photographic Portrait Prize, the photography non-profit CENTER, and the Royal Photographic Society of Great Britain, and was chosen one of PDN's "30 New and Emerging Photographers" in 2018.

Kern's work has been showcased by PBS, The Guardian (London), The Telegraph (London), and National Geographic, with a feature of his "The Unchosen Ones" and "Out to Pasture" series. In 2018, Kehrer Verlag published Kern's monograph, The Sheep and the Goats, which features a conversation with photographer Stuart Klipper and was named one of "The Most Beautiful German Books 2018" by design foundation Stiftung Buchkunst. Kern's next self-published monograph, The Unchosen Ones, won a 2018 Communication Arts "Award of Excellence." the Plains Art Museum, the Center for Creative Photography, and the Griffin Museum of Photography.

Biography Kern was born Robert James Kern in Peekskill, New York in 1978. The son of a military family, he grew up nomadically. Kern developed an interest in photography in high school, which he continued to pursue through independent studies while earning a double major in art & art history and environmental geography at Colgate University (Bachelor of Arts, 2000). Those images earned him exhibition attention and a grant, and would form part of his first monograph, The Sheep and the Goats (Kehrer Verlag, 2018). Kern is represented by the Veronique Wantz Gallery and Olson Larsen Gallery. He works and lives with his family in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Career R. J. Kern, Hazel, Geiranger Fjord, Norway, photograph, 2013. From the series, "Divine Animals: The Bovidae". Kern's work focuses on the intimate, interdependent relationships of people, animals and landscape, exploring nature as a device for understanding ancestry, identity, myth, and history. Critics often note Kern's use of natural and artificial lighting, and his saturated palette, thoughtful composing of subject and landscape, and attention to detail in shadows. and beatific. Writer Alison Nordström noted that like the best documentary, the work "transcends the specificity of time and place." Other critics, such as The Telegraph'''s Hettie Judah, suggested that they touched on the ethics of breeding and the human ability to imagine itself separate from the natural world, The portraits—all collected in Kern's second monograph, The Unchosen Ones—were widely recognized through exhibitions in London (National Portrait Gallery), Japan, the Colorado Photographic Arts Center, and throughout the United States and Canada as part of the traveling show "The FENCE: A Public Photography Exhibition Series" (2016–7). R. J. Kern, Kenzi and Hootie, Anoka County Fair, Minnesota, 2016, photograph, 2016. From the series, "The Unchosen Ones". Collection of the Minneapolis Institute of Art.

Kern returned to the Minnesota State Fair as a subject in 2018 and 2019. His series "The Best of the Best" showcased pairs of 2018 prizewinners (including livestock, bunnies, geese) in an exhibition concurrent with the 2019 fair; curator Deborah Ultan described them as "significant portraits, almost like archetypes” that bridge the history of photography with the present. For the commemorative work, Minnesota State Fair Supreme Champion Pairings from 2018, he photographed difficult-to-wrangle prizewinning farm animals (from horses, llamas to dogs and ducks) individually, their positions mapped out, then combined the images into one print in which the animals appear to be standing together in a row.

Awards and collections Kern has been recognized with several awards and honors. For "The Unchosen Ones," he received: CENTER's 2017 Curator's Choice Award (First Place); He has also been awarded multiple Minnesota State Arts Board Artist Initiative Grants (2016, 2018, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2024, 2025 ). In 2018, Kern was chosen one of PDN's "30 New and Emerging Photographers" and Photolucida 's "Critical Mass Top 50" in 2018, 2021, and 2024 and was an artist in residence at Lakewood Cemetery in 2025. Kern's work resides in several permanent public collections, including the Museum of Fine Arts Houston, Museum of Fine Arts, St. Petersburg, Minneapolis Institute of Art, Plains Art Museum, Center for Creative Photography, Griffin Museum of Photography, Nevada Museum of Art, and the corporate art collections of Fidelity, General Mills, and US Bank.

Books Kern, R. J. (2018). The Sheep and the Goats'', Germany: Kehrer Verlag. Kern, R. J. (2018). The Unchosen Ones, Minneapolis: R. J. Kern. Kern, R. J. (2021). The Unchosen Ones: Portraits of an American Pastoral, New York: MW Editions.