Artist Statement for “Lumens”
A photograph made without a camera? Without a lens? This is the way my current creativity has moved - from a more traditional way of making a photographic print to this alternative method.
A “Lumen” print is produced today as it was in the advent of photography in the 1830’s. It is basically a solar photogram using silver gelatin paper, a subject placed on the surface, and exposed to the sun for an indeterminate amount of time. It is the uncontrolled uniqueness of this image-making that has inspired me to create an entirely new body of work.
During the Covid lockdown of 2020 I was not able to move about as I usually do in making photographs. It was then that I used the flora in my garden, and the sun, to establish a new way of using my old silver gelatin photo paper.
My in-depth knowledge of working in a darkroom to produce Lumen images was an invaluable tool. I used my skills in digital imaging to conceive and construct these hybrid art images. This has been a challenge to my formal way of creating my art, one that has me re-energized to develop more of this new found art.
Artist Statement for “Solitude”
My years of creating images with different types of cameras (analog, digital, pinhole, plastic/toy) have led me to the point in which I have been composing photographs towards what I call a hybrid method. It is using the camera in what it does best, capturing light on film or on a media card, that continues to fill my creative soul.
A good many of my past images were produced with film and printed in my darkroom. After continuing to make photographs using film, instead of spending all of my time in a darkroom, I have moved into the digital world. Now the film is scanned and reworked in Photoshop in order to express my way of appreciating the landscape. This has inspired me to look at both present and past images in a new and exhilarating way.
After spending an extended amount of time in Arizona, “Solitude” is a body of work made through this hybrid method of image making. (The photographs can be seen on my website.) Using plastic modified cameras loaded with black and white film, I have created Images to express my vision of time spent in the Arizona desert.