ARTIST'S STATEMENT

Photography

                I am attracted to alternative ways in which cameras see the world. I was trained as a painter and printmaker. I was asked to teach photography at my school in 1986. I had never previously been in a darkroom but after a year or so of teaching the course, my fascination with photographic possibilities prompted me to give up printmaking for photography. I built my first pinhole cameras about two years later when all my camera equipment was stolen.
                 I modify the tonality and surface of my black & white photographs with bleaches, fixer, toners and emulsions as well as exposing them to light at inappropriate times. I am one of many artists who find it a challenge to explore the alchemy of melding dissimilar media, hoping to create a rich kaleidoscopic surface that is as seductive as the image and hints at an ambiguous time of origin
                 Having lived and photographed in urban environments most of my life, I have witnessed time and again the sustained birth and decay of cultures and place, the constant flux of cities. Many of the places I have photographed over time have been altered. These places could have declined or they could have been completely replaced with something new.  I like to think of my photographs as visual memories,existing in a parallel world.

email: rustart@aol.com
            http://www.commschool.org/

Carol Robinson Gallery
http://www.carolrobinsongallery.com/
Rice Polak Gallery
http://www.ricepolakgallery.com/
Photographic Resource Center at Boston University
http://www.bu.edu/prc/
Pinhole Visions
http://www.pinhole.com/
PinholeResource.
http://www.pinholeresource.com/shop/home
Omniscope Anamorph Pinhole Camera
http://www.abelsonscopeworks.com/cameras/omniscope.htm
‘Made in Poland’ an Exhibition of Seven Polish Pinhole Photographers
www.bostonpolishpinholephotography.com

ARTIST REVIEWS