Thomas Roma

Thomas Roma (formerly Thomas Germano born in 1950) is an American photographer who has worked almost exclusively since 1974 exploring the neighborhoods and institutions of his native Brooklyn, photographing scenes from churches, subways and everyday life, using a homemade camera.

Roma is currently a Full Professor at Columbia University's School for the Arts, and the Director of the Photography Department which he founded. He has also taught photography at Yale University, Fordham University, The Cooper Union, and The School of Visual Arts.

He has been awarded two Guggenheim Fellowships and his work has appeared in one-person and group exhibitions, including one-person shows with accompanying books at the Museum of Modern Art and the International Center of Photography in New York City.

His work is featured in numerous collections, including The Museum of Modern Art, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, The Art Institute of Chicago, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Canadian Centre for Architecture in Montreal.

For one of his collections of photographs, titled Come Sunday, Roma attended more than 150 religious services at 52 churches in Brooklyn over a period of three years.

Siciliano Camera Works

In the 1970s, Roma started manufacturing and selling cameras under the name "Siciliano Camera Works". He produced the medium format "Siciliano", the 35mm panoramic "Pannaroma", as well as a rewind crank for the Leica M2 & M3. To create the panoramic camera, Roma used a Nikon F camera body that was gutted and served merely as a film holder. He milled an adapter out of aircraft aluminum to go between the Nikon body and a Mamiya 50mm Sekor lens. He also made a bright-line optical viewfinder for the camera. The camera was called a “Pannaroma 1X3″, making a play on words between “panorama” and Roma’s wife’s name “Anna,” to create the word "P-anna-roma".

Roma uses a one-of-a-kind medium format camera that he built for himself.

Books by Thomas Roma

Plato's Dogs (2016)
In the Vale of Cashmere (2015)
The Waters of Our Time (2014)
Dear Knights and Dark Horses (2010)
House Calls (2008)
On Three Pillars (2007)
In Prison Air, The Cells of Holmesburg Prison (2005)
Sicilian Passage (2003)
Show & Tell (2002)
Sanctuary (2002)
Enduring Justice (2001)
Higher Ground (1999)
Sunset Park (1998)
Found in Brooklyn (1996)
Come Sunday (1996)

References

“From street stoops to courtrooms, Thomas Roma explores public and private lives in his native Brooklyn,” by Blake Eskin, ‘’ArtNews’’, May 2002

External links

Authority control	WorldCat Identities VIAF: 79423856 LCCN: n95110933 SUDOC: 134367448 ULAN: 500339477

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