| Biography | |
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
Biography A bit of history . . . My arts career started in the 1970�s. As a then student of art with a focus on photography and printmaking my photographic inspirations were Jerry Uelsmann (Silver Meditations), Lee Friedlander, and, perhaps incongruously, the work of Diane Arbus. On the printmaking side of things I found the work of Robert Rauschenberg, Jasper Johns, and the photorealist painter Richard Estes of particular interest. My photographic and arts career in the 70�s included ongoing work for a planetarium, a museum of natural history, enjoying the providential experience of working with Eliot Porter on an expedition to the Newfoundland coast as a photographer, and numerous freelance photography jobs as diverse as a short- lived greyhound racing magazine and Billboard magazine. Even though these experiences helped to (barely) pay the bills, my first love was fine art black and white photography and silkscreen printing, with studios for both tucked away in rented basements and the attics of completely generous friends and collaborators. Having come to my senses in the late 70�s due to an abiding feeling that I was not yet and may never become a mature artist, my career path changed and I became an architect, another first love, and have been practicing architecture for various firms for the past 27 years in a richly rewarding service to others. During this period I rarely picked up a camera unless it was to chronicle the events of my fast growing children and their disappearing act into adulthood. Suddenly all things changed, as they are want to do. In 2002 I picked up a camera again and was passionately/magnetically drawn to a view that the patterns in nature that so eloquently reflect the conditions of time and light while awake, are also reflective of a dreamy feeling that we are, as the viewer, inseparable from the experience of it, and that we are internally the producers of it. Each moment of time and experience of view contain these qualities, if only we would take the time to examine them. The work in general . . . . Almost all of my current work is both panoramic and in color, stitched together from multiple views. Panoramic work is an inherent quality of both a planetarium environment and the practice of architecture, which is why I am drawn to it and surrounded by it. The feeling expressed when viewing these pieces is that one could walk into them, if only they were large enough, like a diorama at a museum. I find that they also work quite well on the other end of the size spectrum, small pieces of color and form to be examined. I use both digital and film cameras to produce these images through digital means. I freely manipulate color to bring out the inherent qualities of each scene while attempting to remain true to the actual experience of the photographic event. I also use high dynamic range techniques which I find more accurately representative of the abilities of the human eye to perceive qualities of light and shade. The final products are produced as archival inkjet prints in my studio. |