CCA News

Alumnus Spotlight: Eric McNatt

Posted on Monday, November 17, 2008, by Jim Norrena

Eric McNatt graduated early from an arts high school in Austin, Texas. The only art colleges he had heard of then were Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) and the San Francisco Art Institute (SFAI). He began a summer program at the Art Institute, but quickly realized it wasn’t the best place for him.

“The more interesting stuff I was seeing was the crafts-oriented work coming out of CCAC. It seemed more authentic. It had a sincerity to it,” he explains. Although McNatt had been studying with a dedicated group of students at the Art Institute, he felt more at home with CCA’s philosophy and approach.

McNatt therefore came to CCA and entered the Painting/Drawing Program, but during his junior year he enrolled in photography classes. Studying with CCA photography faculty members Larry Sultan, Jim Goldberg, and Chris Johnson opened up a whole new world for McNatt: “Chris Johnson taught me about the zone system and Ansel Adams, and I started getting obsessed with it. Without his direction I wouldn’t have gone the way I did.” Yet despite focusing on photography during his last years, “I’m still a drawer at heart,” he admits.

McNatt recalls a time at CCA when Larry Sultan invited the photography director from the New York Times to speak in class. “It was the first time I had to think about the larger scale of what was going on in contemporary photography outside the Bay Area. I appreciated CCAC’s attempt to try to bring in those references,” McNatt says.

Such exposure inspired McNatt to seek summer internships in New York to continue learning about photography. “Working at magazines in New York helped me understand what it was like to work in real photo departments,” he explains. Following graduation he moved to New York to pursue full-time work.

Today a busy commercial photographer, McNatt’s work has appeared in such publications as Esquire, Harper’s Bazaar, Interview, Life, New York magazine, Paper, People, Vogue, and Wired, among others. (His proudest accomplishment is shooting the band The White Stripes for the cover of Interview magazine.)

Born in Arizona

CCA degree:
BFA 1995, Painting/Drawing

Residence:
New York

Current occupation:
Commercial photographer

Influences at CCA:
Stephen Ajay, Richard Gayton, Jim Goldberg, Chris Johnson, Larry Sultan

Website:
www.ericmcnatt.com