Pierre Ware was selected for Mia’s first Visual Resources DEI Fellowship in the fall of 2023. Over the next twelve months, Ware immersed himself in the museum, shooting everything from art objects to ad campaigns. Dan Dennehy, Mia’s longtime Head of Visual Resources, initiated the fellowship in partnership with Mia’s DEI Division, and says the staff learned at least as much. “To pair with someone at a different point in his career, with different experiences—that was so valuable for us, too,” Dennehy says. “As museums reimagine how we engage with cultural heritage, it’s wonderful to see through the lens of young people who are just really excited about the work and don’t have preconceptions about what it should be.” Here, having completed the one-year fellowship, Ware shares what he learned, what he’ll miss, and what comes next.
I photographed so much: sculptures, paintings, works on paper. For the museum’s Tibetan Shrine Room, I photographed three hundred artworks in three weeks, shot gallery views, and then did 3D scans of a lot of the objects. That was kind of the purpose of this fellowship: to learn what it’s like to be a day-to-day photographer in a museum space.
Everyone in Mia’s photo studio—Dan Dennehy, Charles Walbridge, Josh Lynn—was willing to teach me. They followed my speed and eventually allowed me to go out and do my own thing. To learn from people who have been in the field for years helped me take my work to a different level. My technical expertise flourished.
I really bonded with photogrammetry—the 3D scanning of objects. In fact, I was able to do a presentation on it at the Getty, as part of the Cultural Heritage Imaging Professionals Conference. Mia is ahead of the curve in a space that’s dominated by museums with a lot more resources, and I was so lucky to be a part of that.
I also really appreciated the BIPOC employee group at Mia. It was my first experience of a group like that at work. One time, a colleague cooked for us. Another time, someone came in to teach us watercolor painting. Sometimes we just had a game night. It really added to the work experience.
Ware photographed the scenes that were illustrated for Mia’s 2024 summer ad campaign.
I like photographing people—talking to them, having that intimate moment. I love when you can curate something together. I bring a certain look to it, they bring a certain style to it, and we both make something really special. It means a lot to me.
That said, I also like documentary work, where I’m not a main character in the piece. The people coming together are the main character, and I get to float around and document the moment and make something memorable for them.
Whatever I’m shooting, I like to find that thing that when I’m looking through the viewfinder I can say, ‘I enjoy what that looks like,’ and then I can visualize the shot. I’m going to edit it like this, I’m going to crop it like this—I can make that come to life. It makes me extremely happy when something I saw and thought in that moment ‘Oh yeah, that’s the one!’ actually ends up being the one.
I brought to Mia who I am, a unique perspective, being able to capture things the way I do. And now I have some mentors and some key technical skills that photographers often need to apply for jobs. I don’t know if I’ll continue working with cultural heritage. I made some great connections with the Getty. I’d love to work with the Smithsonian. So, I might end up in D.C.
What artwork would I take with me if I could? It would be super-inconvenient and obnoxious, but I’d take the oversize dog sculpture [Your Dog, by Yoshitomo Nara]. I don’t even know what I’d do with it. Put it in a rented warehouse until I could get a bigger space. Someday, I’ll get a big house and it’ll be the first thing you see when you walk in: big stairs and a big dog.
As told to Tim Gihring, Mia’s blog editor, and edited for length and clarity.