Test of Faith

Lauren Pond is an award-winning freelance photographer based in Columbus, Ohio, the manager of the Fresh A.I.R. Gallery, and a multimedia content producer for the Center for the Study of Religion at Ohio State University. Pond earned a B.S. and B.A. at Northwestern University in 2009 and an M.A. from Ohio University in 2014. Her photographs have been seen in solo and group exhibitions throughout the United States and in Australia. Pond has also spoken extensively on her work at academic conferences and universities in the United States. Peter Barberie is the Brodsky Curator of Photographs, Alfred Stieglitz Center, at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. In 2014, Barberie organized the exhibition Paul Strand: Master of Modern Photography, an in-depth retrospective of Strand's photography and films that has traveled internationally. He also organized the exhibition Zoe Strauss: Ten Years, a major mid-career survey of Strauss's photography. Barberie has written widely on contemporary art and received his Ph.D. from Princeton University in 2007.

Foreword / Peter Barberie Photographs and Text / Lauren Pond Afterword / Lauren Pond Acknowledgments About the Prize

"Visually stunning.... Pond is deeply aware of the ethical quandaries of photographing a person while he is dying, which she writes about in a theologically provocative afterword. Her photographic eye is more compassionate than voyeuristic, and she captures something of the essence of Wolford's faith even while hesitating to pin it down." (Christianity Today) "Open the book, and whether you are of faith or not, see what Pond came to see: people of faith, enduring to an end we all face. See sign followers seeking only to be obedient to their God. See people believing, loving and caring, backsliding and returning to be baptized again. And yes, dying. See people so human in their failings and need for re-baptism that a common saying among believers (however baptized) is that even the fish know who they are. Pond's magnificent book will introduce them to you." - Ralph W. Hood, Jr. (Reading Religion) "To move through this book is to feel the author unwind herself. We feel her taking the measure of the space in which her subjects live. Services that were once photographed as delirious frenzy are now shown as infused with calm, though no less ecstatic. We get a sense that Pond has arrived somewhere very different than where she sought to go when she began, and it also feels like the beginning of a larger story." - Leo Hsu (Fraction Magazine) "Capturing the true essence of this type of religious phenomenon is delicate. One must balance scene with sensitivity. Pond's work in Test of Faith is a well-blanced blend of both qualities. . . . She invites viewers, through her photography and dialogue, to embark on a journey to understand more deeply the people who take on these acts of faith and who choose to live within a particular lifestyle." - Chelsie Dubay (Journal of Appalachian Studies)