About Me
“Photographs are created and not taken” I am sure I am not the first person to say this but I am one who believes this. Seldom does an image become a finished print right out of the camera. In Fact I would say that is a one in a million shot. Creating fine artwork in photography takes patience and timing along with skill to tease out the story visually within the image. Art is about the impact of emotion the viewer gets from the work, and photography is no exception.
My roots in photography go deep. I started with a cheap point and shoot loaded with a roll of Kodak TriX and the energy to shoot photographs of everything around me. As I got older my skills grew and refined. I found influences in the likes of Eliot Porter, Edware Weston and Michael Kenna to name a few. I identified with the power that black and white had to relay a story through a wide scale of gray tones and a solid composition. A simple singular subject well placed is one of the most powerful images in black and white in my view.
As the times changed so did my tools I used to create my work but not my technique. Lightroom and PhotoShop have replaced the darkroom but the way I use them is very similar. Dodging, burning and toning are still the tools I use without too much heavy manipulation, but enough to bring out the story I’m telling.
Not only am I a photographic artist but an advocate for cycling. From the first bike, I had the taste for freedom and being a part of the environment as I pedaled. It's the most efficient way to travel while being kind to the environment and yourself. Where before I had kept my cycling and photography separate, now I let them crossover. I feel the two in the right context will make my work more interesting in the long run.
The photography I have and will create here are of subjects near to who I am and what I believe. We are all part of nature and in order to survive on this pale blue dot, we must treat with reverence and respect that the only home we have, deserves. To believe we can trash this place and find another like it, is myired in folly. There is nowhere in the near distance to run to and no one that we know of, who will save us. We are alone, a single oasis sailing in a universe so vast that distance is measured by the speed of light traveled in years.
I hope you will take the time to look through the pages of work that I have created. If there is anything you feel a need to place on your wall, visit my print shot to find its availability to purchase. Also feel free to ask questions of me on my contact page about my work.
Thank you for spending your valuable time at my website.
Gallery List
Cedar Rapids Museum of Art; March 2017 to present www.crma.org/
Mcgowan House Artisan; 2010 to 2015 (closed)
Worked with
Unity Point, St Luke's Hospital Cedar Rapids Pathology Department
Unity Point, St Luke's Hospital Cedar Rapids Medical Laboratory Science Department