Spencer Finch is an American artist. After attending The Hotchkiss School, he graduated magna cum laude with a B.A. in comparative literature from Hamilton College in 1985. Finch then pursued an M.F.A. in sculpture from the Rhode Island School of Design, graduating in 1989. The first retrospective of his work, which ended in March 2008, was assembled at MASS MoCA in North Adams, MA. He currently lives and works in Brooklyn, NY.
Finch produces work in a wide variety of mediums, including watercolor, photography, glass, electronics, video and fluorescent lights. He is perhaps best known for dealing with the elusive concepts of memory and perception through light installations. After measuring with a colorimeter the light that exist naturally in a specific place and time, Finch's re-constructs the luminosity of the location through artificial means. For example, Moonlight, replicates the exact light of the full moon that shone over the desert of Luna County, New Mexico on the evening of July 13, 2003.