Educational background:
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BFA: James Madison University Harrisonburg, VA
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MFA (Fine art photography): Cranbrook Academy of Art
Bloomfield Hills, MI.
Artist Overview
I have been creating fine art photography for over 40 years. I started my exploration of photography in the darkroom, developing black and white film at James Madison University and later at Cranbrook Academy of Art as I pursued my Master's of Fine Arts degree. At Cranbrook I was influenced by a multitude of photographers and artists - like Duane Michals, Linda Conners, Minor White, Jerry Uelsmann, Carl Toth, Salvador Dali, Joseph Cornell to name a few. Intrigued by surrealism and the ability of photographs to bend the rules of reality, I started investigating TV shows like the "Twilight Zone", childhood fairy tale stories, and how we use images for marketing. This took me to the creation of some of the images displayed in the "Cranbrook Days" portfolio collection. I would take slides of miniature toy sets I had built and along with other images, project them onto hanging fabric with multiple projectors. I then re-photographed those projections to create the final image.
Over the years as film cameras and darkrooms got replaced by digital cameras and computers, I transitioned into the images I refer to as realistic abstract photography. An example of these images is in my "Man-Nature-Made Series". I used the layering of organic/inorganic, nature/man-made on top of each other in a translucent and transformative manner – often creating a texture that nature imposed on the man-made and vice-versa. It became a metaphoric representation of the interaction and influences between humans and nature. I use photography as a mechanical process to render a realistic, but abstract painterly effect. Displayed here on this page are some of the individual images used to create my multi-layered final photograph. I take all of the individual photographs that I use in my final composition. I invite you to take a visual journey through the images and let your imagination be your guide.
