Shannon Nahara

Shannon Nahara is a Midwestern-based visual artist and art therapist working in photography, collage, and mixed media. Her practice explores the intersections of memory, myth, and the unconscious through layered imagery that invites reflection and transformation.

She holds a BFA from the Cleveland Institute of Art (1993), an MFA from Cranbrook Academy of Art (1996), and an MA in Transpersonal Psychology with an emphasis in Art Therapy from Naropa University (2016). Shannon’s work creates visual narratives that bridge personal and collective experience.

She has exhibited across the United States. Most recently, her work was featured in the fine art magazine Photo Trouvée, issues 17 and 18. She was also one of nine artists selected internationally for a 10-week artist residency by Photo Trouvéein 2025.


Artist Statement

My current work is a meditation on time, memory, and the psyche. As both an artist and art therapist, I create photographic collages that weave together historic found photographs, contemporary images, and my own photography. These layered compositions explore how visual fragments from different eras can coexist in a shared, symbolic space, inviting the viewer into a dialogue between past and present, conscious and unconscious.

Inspired by myth and depth psychology, I view these collages as vessels for transformation. Old photographs carry traces of untold stories and cultural memory, and when placed in new visual contexts, they become catalysts for reflection, healing, and imaginative re-visioning. I am drawn to the mysterious, timeless quality of the found image, how it holds both specificity and universality, like an archetype surfacing through personal and collective history. I feel that art can be an opening into forgotten histories, inner landscapes, and the ever-evolving nature of human consciousness.


https://www.instagram.com/alchemyphoto/