The annual Viewpoint Members’ Exhibit, a long-time tradition at Viewpoint, is always exciting for the quality and range of photographic art it showcases. Because it gives all Viewpoint members an opportunity to showcase one image of their choosing, the exhibit highlights the diversity of techniques, approaches, and personal visions in our photographic community.
In June, Viewpoint Photographic Art Center presents in its main gallery the photographs of László Bencze in an exhibition titled Onsite: Men of Mining.
“Mining companies get a bad rap in the press,” says László. “No one wants a mine in their back yard. On the other hand everyone wants computers, TV sets, cars, cameras, washing machines, cell phones and all the other good stuff of modern culture. And just about all of that good stuff begins life somewhere in the ground.
“The people of mining work hard, safe, and honorably, taking pains to cause as little damage to the environment as possible and remediating that which is inevitable. I have enjoyed my assignments onsite and have come to admire these dedicated workers, craftsmen, and artisans who transform dirt into the raw material of civilization.
Viewpoint Photographic Art Center presents the exhibit Ancient Textures of the Sevier Orogeny by Viewpoint member Ron Williams in the Step Up Gallery in June.
The Sevier Orogeny was a mountain-forming event that affected North America along the western slope of the Rocky Mountains during the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods. Sevier refers to the Sevier River, whose headwaters originate in the Zion National Park region. Millions of years of tectonic action, erosion of carving rivers, volcanic episodes, and glacial scraping have created these fascinating surreal landscapes. “This body of work,” says Ron, “focuses on the hidden beauty in close-ups of textures in the geologic detail”. Very little photo manipulation was applied to these images shot along Highway 9 just east of the Mt. Carmel Tunnel in Zion National Park.
In January, Viewpoint Gallery honors Gene Kennedy with a retrospective exhibition that he intriguingly calls 44 Years of Real Estate Photographs.
“For many years, I have struggled to find a single phrase that describes what I do photographically,” Kennedy states. “From nature photography to landscape photography to architectural photography to environmental documentary photography to humorous photography to Gladding McBean photography — nothing covers it all. Recently, as I turned my career energies in a new direction ... I stumbled onto that elusive phrase.”
How do visual images convey a sense of place? From the jungles of the Amazon rainforest to the icy glaciers of Antarctica to the festive streets of Venice, three Viewpoint photographers define place through color, form and gesture.
Larry Brenden brings us a world that few have experienced: Antarctica, a continent completely surrounded by ocean with a desert climate which receives less than 3 inches of precipitation annually. "Though isolated by geography, the Antarctic continent is not isolated from the ravages of Global Warming and water conservation. This environment, one of the last pristine frontiers, is extremely vulnerable to our daily decisions about energy and waste." Many travelers expect white snow and black rocks; when in fact the clean air and unpolluted environment contribute to a kaleidoscope of colors.
Dolores Frank plunged into the festive world of the Venetian carnavale, an annual celebration with roots in many traditions, from the Latin feast of Saturnalia to the Greek feast of Dionysian cults celebrating the start of spring. "People come from all over the world to display their extravagant costumes and masks. For those who choose not to adorn themselves, there are many celebrations planned which show the heart of Venice. It is a happy time with thousands of people celebrating."
David L. Robertson explored a slice of the Brazilian rainforest in 2007, venturing upriver in canoes around the town of Manaus. "In the villages, the houses would often contain a dozen or more occupants. At night, hammocks would be strung from hooks in the ceiling to accommodate all of the evening residents." Robertson came away from his experience with a renewed sense of the diversity of cultures around the world.
Three visual artists in three evocative settings. Join us for a visual exploration of place.
Viewpoint Photographic Art Center is pleased to present the exhibit Cuba: Opening Doors by Jan Lightfoot in its Step Up Gallery in September. The genesis of this exhibit began with a recent opportunity to travel and photograph in Cuba. Lightfoot found that, for an outsider, “Cuba transports one back in time, to a place that can only be imagined.”
“Cuba remains shrouded in mystery for most Americans,” says Lightfoot. “Life in Cuba is hard; most people wake up everyday wondering if they will have anything to eat that day. In the faces of many, hope is gone, and in others you see nothing else but hope. Time itself, for the people of Cuba, became one of the enduring issues to strike me, and I have tried to convey that.”
Donald Fried became fascinated with photography 45 years ago, as a student of architecture, living in Chicago. From his early days photographing people in Lincoln Park Zoo, bus depots, and other urban settings around Chicago, to later work in portraiture and documenting western landscapes, Fried's photography reflects his lifelong interests in social inquiry and human impact on the environment.
Donald Fried has dedicated his first solo exhibit to autism research. All exhibit proceeds will be donated to the U.C. Davis MIND Institute, 2825 50th Street, Sacramento, 95817.
Viewpoint member Jim Klein of Lincoln will present work at the Step Up Gallery at Viewpoint in March, 2012. The photographs are the result of travel to Utah, a place universally known for its ancient and dramatic landscapes and also its much newer remains of man’s presence.
Klein cites John Szarkowski, famed photographer, critic and historian, who, in his book The Photographer’s Eye, “included Time as one of the defining aspects of photography as an art medium. But his consideration of time had more to do with how much of time was captured by the camera’s shutter than how time is conveyed by the image.”
The two sets of images in this exhibit, a deserted motel on Highway 70 near Moab and abstracts of rocks from Utah’s National Parks, depict the effects of time, and, in another perspective, timelessness.
Viewpoint Gallery is pleased to present a solo exhibition of internationally renowned photographer Linda Connor. Her photographs depict the relationship between the culturally sacred and natural world while illuminating her connection to and deep respect for her subjects. With her large format camera, Connor travels extensively, exploring sites that evoke mystery and spirit. These explorations of ancient and sacred locales reflect her interest in how diverse cultures manifest the holy.
In October of 2008 over 200 students of all ages joined together to document the economic, educational and cultural transformation occurring in Oak Park, Sacramento’s oldest suburb. The cameras used ranged from high end digital to plastic film cameras from the Dollar Store. Many of the students were from the neighborhood. Between the hours of 8 a.m. and 4 p.m., more than 20,000 pictures were made. More important, though, were the connections made.
Jean Ross shares her intimate images from India, taken on a six-week trip that included the more familiar sights of Rajasthan, including the camel fair at Pushkar, and Varanasi, as well as the less traveled eastern states. Ross says, “India is like no place else on earth. It is a travelers’ and photographers’ paradise with unrivaled diversity of landscape and culture; wonderful food and kind people; amazing history and monuments and all the comforts and discomforts of modern day life.”
Larry Brenden searches the Western United States to find compelling natural landscape images. His work conveys greater intimacy than typical landscape photographs and explores nature’s gorgeous color palette. Brenden says: “I am always looking, but more specifically, I am looking to photograph light, color, and form. To me, photography is all-consuming. A demanding discipline which entails my senses, intellect, and emotion, it is at once my passion and my spiritual base.”
“Using the camera as a tool, my intention is to quietly unveil nature’s secrets with integrity and capture an image true to the scene as first observed. Through the lens I seek to reveal the grandeur of the natural world, uncover her subtleties, show her impressive power, and expose her delicate side. Often, I examine a scene and decipher symmetrical patterns in the seemingly chaotic environment. Recording light and form is at once a fascination and a mystery. It is my goal to present well-crafted, un-doctored, aesthetic prints of the world’s beautifully wild places both to preserve and with full intent to protect.“
A former design engineer in the computer industry, Larry has spent the last decade as a respected photographer of the natural scene.
In its main gallery in May, Viewpoint Photographic Art Center presents Day to Night, a collection of images by Jennifer Wu, made between dusk and dawn, during the hours when many photographers have set their cameras aside.
“I found great joy the night I discovered that the camera sees more than our eyes can see,” says Jennifer, an accomplished landscape and nature photographer. She found that the kinds of exposures needed for moonlit or starlit landscapes showed many more stars in the sky than she saw with the naked eye. Experimenting with the low-light capabilities of current high-end digital cameras, she developed techniques to maximize the detail in the sky and the landscape while portraying the stars as points of light rather than as the ‘star trail’ lines characteristic of the long exposures needed when photographing the same types of scenes with film cameras.
Click here to download the 2012 Auction Contribution Form
The April exhibit at Viewpoint displays the wonderful prints available for purchase in the 2012 Viewpoint Fine Print Auction and Fundraiser. Many well known photographers are featured in this year's the exhibit, along with many other talented Viewpoint members and supporters.
Prints may be purchased now through May 4 in the Online Silent Auction and/or on Saturday, May 5th at the Live Auction. Visit the AUCTION PAGE for the Catalog, the Online Auction, Instant Purchases, Pre-Bidding for the Live Auction, and additional information.
There is a place in our minds where we experience the inspiration of creative art; there is another realm where we ponder the rational calculations of science. But what happens when we put these insights together? We grasp the tangible beauty of the world.
Three accomplished photographers explore the intersections of art and science in this exhibit. Bob Fera and Mike Mayda point their cameras to the heavens to capture astonishing images of faraway galaxies; Terry Nathan follows the curving arcs of tiny whiffs of smoke and connects them to the seminal ideas of Isaac Newton. Together these three artists invite us to ponder the scientific dimensions of art, and the artistic insights of science.
Viewpoint Photographic Art Center is pleased to present the exhibit Searching for Wabi Sabi by Bruce MacDougall in its Step Up Gallery in October.
The photographs in Searching for Wabi Sabi “represent my effort at coming to terms with what life dumped in my lap the morning of April 29, 2010,” says MacDougall. “My daughter Molly was murdered that day.”
Wabi sabi is a Japanese aesthetic that values objects and images reflecting the transience and imperfection that characterize our existence; it eschews the idealized, the formal, the ornate. “My daughter Ruby introduced me to wabi sabi,” MacDougall recalls, “in the hope that I would find some level of acceptance of Molly’s death within the tenets of wabi sabi: nothing is permanent; nothing is finished; nothing is perfect.”
The July exhibit at Viewpoint is the annual Members' Exhibit, featuring Viewpoint members' finest work from right here in Sacramento and around the globe. Come see what our members are up to!
Over the years, field trips sponsored by Viewpoint Gallery have inspired photographers to interpret, study, record, and reinterpret static and dynamic elements of the natural and manmade worlds that partially define Northern California.
This exhibit presents distinctive features belonging to sites of historical significance, recorded alongside spontaneous beauty captured in outdoor environments. The destinations for these excursions have included Preston Castle in Ione, Knight Foundry and Machine Shop of Sutter Creek, Bodie State Historic Park in Mono County, the Cosumnes River Preserve near Galt, and Mare Island Historic Park (a former Naval base and shipyard) in Vallejo.
Joseph Finkleman’s Fragile and Passing Patterns of imagery will be featured in the Step Up Gallery at Viewpoint Photographic Art Center during the month of June and the first week of July. Finkleman makes mostly abstract paintings with the brush we know as photography.
“This show, like much of my work, eliminates a great deal if not all context. I find in this work an interesting question. We will look at something and state that 'this' is a picture, and 'that' is not a picture. There is a boundary line, maybe more accurately, a boundary layer there and I try to place the 'this' is a picture as closely as possible to the boundary of 'that' is not a picture, in order to examine why is 'this' a picture and 'that' is not.”
The April exhibit at Viewpoint displays the amazing prints available this month in the 2011 Viewpoint Fine Print Auction and Fundraiser. This year’s featured photographers include Bruce Barnbaum, Tim Baskerville, Ruth Bernhard, Larry Blackwood, Howard Bond, Nan Brown, Ray Carofano, Martha Casanave, Mark Citret, Charles Cramer, Charles Farmer, Joan Gentry, Mark Howell, Geir Jordahl, Lewis Kemper, Michael Kenna, Gene Kennedy, Don Kirby, Machiko Kurita, Margaretta Mitchell, Richard Murai, Dianne Poinski, Ron Reeder, Merg Ross, Ron Rosenstock, Dominic Rouse, Ryuijie, John Sexton, Jock Sturges, Jerry Takigawa, John Wimberley, and Huntington Witherill. Many other Viewpoint members and supporters are also represented.
Prints may be purchased April 6 through May 6 in the Silent Online Auction and/or on Saturday, May 7th at the Live Auction. Visit the AUCTION PAGE for the Catalog, the Online Auction, and additional information.
Clockwise from top left: John Wimberley, Lewis Kemper, Michael Kenna, Frank Francis.
Clockwise from top left: John Johnson, Ron Rosenstock, Charles Traub, Merg Ross.
Viewpoint Photographic Art Center is pleased to present the work of sister and brother Brittany Murphy and Camden Hosea-Small in the Step Up Gallery beginning January 11, 2012. Both of them are presenting new visions in still-life photography, Murphy finding and bringing out the beauty in everyday objects, Hosea-Small exploring the sensual qualities of the smoke rising from burning incense.
Murphy uses darkness and a black backdrop, with a flashlight for “light painting” to visually erase portions of an object while illuminating others. Hosea-Small uses a narrow-beam strobe to sidelight smoke trails, also against a black backdrop.
Jonathan Mumby is a traditional landscape photographer – he exposes black and white film in a large view camera. Strongly influenced by the works of Ansel Adams and Brett Weston, he finds that lugging a heavy camera for many miles to make an exposure makes the photograph more satisfying. "I feel I don't just take the photograph – I earn it." The American western landscape is his favorite subject.
Viewpoint Environmental Art Fair
Viewpoint Gallery is joining with nonprofit nature conservation and educational groups to host the Viewpoint Environmental Art Fair for the opening of Robert Glenn Ketchum's November exhibit, co-sponsored by KVIE public television.
There will be live music, a silent auction, and booths by our nonprofit partners in the adjacent courtyard (details below). Viewpoint Gallery will also launch new membership options with fine art images by Lewis Kemper, Roman Loranc, and John Wimberley, and silk scarves featuring photographic designs by Robert Glenn Ketchum. Silent auction items will include fine art prints, guided raft trips, canoe tours, coffee table books, dinner vouchers, and more.
The 2010 Viewpoint Member's Exhibit showcases the extraordinary diversity and quality of work created by Viewpoint members. The breadth of the show is enormous, with photographs ranging from abstracts to architecture, people to landscape, and still life to documentary. The techniques used to make the prints range from antique alternative processes to traditional gelatin silver printing to the ubiquitous blossoming of the digital methods of today. There is truly something for everyone!
Gary McLaughlin: Bottles, Buenos Aires
Viewpoint’s March exhibit showcases The Anasazi Project by husband-and-wife photographers Don Kirby and Joan Gentry.
Cliff dwellings in the Four Corners region sheltered and protected the Anasazi people towards the end of their 1500-year presence in the region (200 BC to 1300 AD). Sited high on canyon walls in spectacular alcoves, the ruins seem to radiate the energy and mystery of this vanished culture. Kirby’s and Gentry’s long-term photographic exploration of the Anasazi began with “a disappointing photograph” of one of the ruins, but curiosity about a culture capable of such achievement took hold, and three years of study led to a growing respect for the Anasazi’s energy, perseverance, and artistry. Kirby and Gentry have now photographed in Anasazi country for over twenty years, making photographs that “attempt to express this great respect.”
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Viewpoint Photographic Art Center is the proud recipient of a SMAC Cultural Arts Award grant.
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