Indiana Pastoral: The Photography of Lamar Richcreek

Image: Lamar Richcreek (American, 1947–2018), Untitled from the Series Ideal Farm, 2004, chromogenic color print, gift of Jean Richcreek, 2024.006.011.

September 18 – December 19, 2025

Ball State alumnus Lamar Richcreek (1947–2018) earned a degree in business administration in 1969. After a 24-year career in banking, he launched a second career in photography. In his 50s, he returned to school, earned an MFA at Vermont College of Fine Arts, and taught for 20 years as an adjunct professor of photography at the Herron School of Art + Design in Indianapolis. His success as a fine art photographer resulted in a solo exhibition at the Indianapolis Museum of Art in 2002.

Like the pastoral genre in literature, art, and music, Lamar Richcreek’s photographs often present nostalgic visual stories of Indiana’s agricultural landscape inflected by his business perspective. He once wrote in an artist’s statement, “My views of the landscape, agriculture and the family farm are romanticized ones, originating from childhood experiences and visits to my grandfather’s farm in Central Indiana. In the aftermath of World War II and during the Cold War years, the Midwest saw the creation of global markets for farm products and the development of technological advances that were invented to increase production for improved and insured profitability, all of which transformed American farming. These transformations favored agri-businesses and multi-national corporations, thereby altering the viability of the traditional family farm. This change occurred over time without my realizing its impact.”

Lamar Richcreek’s photography testifies to the effects of the post-war economic-agricultural boom in the Midwest through his images with surreal settings, witty juxtapositions, and sublime scenery. A recent donation of art from his wife, Jean Richcreek (1948–2025), to the David Owsley Museum of Art allows subsequent generations to view the corporatization of farming in Indiana through Lamar Richcreek’s creative lens. We are also grateful to Ball State alumnus Thomas Murphy (‘69) for his recent philanthropic investment in DOMA in memory of Lamar and Jean Richcreek.