Artists

Artist’s Statement

My work rests on more than six decades of learning to make what I call “expressive” photographs. My equipment has ranged and evolved from classic large-format film to digital cell phone cameras, with many stops between.  Since the early 1970s I have sold images in street markets, art fairs, galleries, exhibitions, publications, and online. Except for a university photojournalism class in the 1960s, I have been self-taught through experience, reading, and interaction with other photographers.

I had a young man’s dream of glory as a photographic artist, inspired by Ansel Adams, Edward Weston, and others.  Glory not forthcoming, I spent most of my career in communications for non-profit and university-based research organizations. I retired in 2010 and bought my first digital camera, donating my darkroom to a community college. Today I make photographs primarily for myself, but always seeking to share them. I show my work as ink-pigment (giclee) prints.

My photography is grounded in the idea that my subjects can speak for themselves. My concept of an expressive photograph, then, is one that seeks to express what its subject is saying and only incidentally to document or show the subject itself. When I make an image, I try to understand and capture what my subject says to me. The print is a performance that seeks to share that understanding.

I believe creating any work of art is only half the process. Art finds its completion in the mind of the person with whom it is engaged. Therefore, if you were ask what the subject of my image may be, I may respond: “What does it say to you?” I don’t expect you to report that in so many words, but rather that you should think about it and complete your half of the creative experience.