Dan Herrera is an imagemaker and educator living and working out of Sacramento, CA. Inspired by the power of objects as a means to tell a story, he creates photographs with robust physical qualities that transcend what can be communicated on a digital screen. His interdisciplinary studio practice merges narrative and research with intentional methods of historical, contemporary, and alternative photography.
Dan’s collaborative and community-based work examines the construction of identity and sense of place in the Latinx community within systems of privilege and oppression. Further collaborations include the University of California 4-H (UC 4-H) youth development program where he co-produces an ongoing series of nutrition educational videos that target food insecure youth. As a practicing artist, his efforts have led to an invitational lectures at University of Pittsburgh (2014), presenting works relating to narrative and historical process, and a juried lecture at The Society of Photographic Education (2019) where he delivered a research-based scholar presentation on the evolution of internet memes as a pathway to social justice, and Princeton University (2023) where he presented research on sustainable processes as narrative.
His national publication record includes college-level academic textbooks, most recently The Book of Alternative Photographic Processes, 3rd Edition, 2015, and Light & Lens: Photography in the Digital Age, 3rd Edition, 2018. Exhibitions of his work have appeared at SOHO Photo in New York, the Los Angeles Center for Digital Art, the de Young Museum in San Francisco, including a solo show at the Marin Museum of Contemporary Art. Additionally, his commercial photography background includes editorial work for Juxtapoz Magazine, Sacramento, magazine, Vicious Vanity F/X, Oak Park Brewing Company, and Marky Ramone of the iconic punk band The Ramones.
As a lecturer in the California State University system, he teaches a wide range of analog, alternative process, and commercial photography courses. His teaching experience extends beyond the classroom where he also facilitates private workshops on his unique approach to image making. This includes collaborative peer-teaching workshops that address principles of mindful looking and the action of light - using accessible, low-tech methods to create photograms, cyanotypes, and experimental plant based printing methods.