Category Archives: Collections

Prints Heading Out to Bernie Sanders’ Office

Prints ready for FedEx to Bernie Sanders' Office

I should be back tomorrow with a new image and some writing, but I’ll be heading out to FedEx soon to send off these prints to Washington DC to hang in Bernie Sanders’ office. I am a Vermont resident, and in fact have lived in Vermont more than anywhere else in my life, by far. (For the other part of my adult life, I’ve crossed the Connecticut River into New Hampshire for some stretches). So the news is that an intern from Bernie’s office contacted me requesting the loan of some images to hang in the DC office. I gave them various options, and in the end they picked these four, which of course are all Vermont images. They’ll be there for a year, and I’m pleased about it.

One thing that is interesting is that out of all of the range of papers I print on, these are all images I print on Epson Hot Press Natural paper, a creamy and velvety matte paper with a warm tone. I like this paper for infrared photos, because it tends to look more natural, and I sometimes like it for snow scenes because it gives a smoother rendering of images with a lot of high key or white in them. Two of the images are infrared, and the other two “normal” capture, one on black and white sheet film.

The images are:

Three Trees, South Strafford
This is an early exposure of mine, exposed to 4 x 5 film. I was a skinny young adult just out of college, schlepping a big view camera around. In my darkroom days I used to print it on a warm tone portrait paper, Agfa Portriga I think it was called, and then tone it hard with selenium. So I print it the same way now.
Three Trees, South Strafford Vermont

Haying in Progress, Barn, South Woodstock, Vermont
This was a day when I had a lot of time in this location, in South Woodstock, Vermont. A pleasant summer day, and I had time to pass. They did a lot of work on that hay field while I was there, and the clouds of course changed quickly and constantly. I made a lot of exposures with a normal camera and also the infrared camera. This one, from the infrared, is the one I’ve picked of them all as the best.
Haying and Barn, South Woodstock Vermont

Field of Dandelions and Barn
This is a conventional capture, printed as black and white. I’m very lucky to have this particular hayfield a short walk from my house. Most years, the dandelions go crazy. It’s a rare year though when there is a good bloom and seed-set like this, and also an opportunity to photograph the full display before the wind, a thunderstorm, or the hay-cutters take them down. I haven’t managed to photograph quite such a display in more recent years, when some changes in camera and lens choices would make it interesting to experiment. As it is, I’m not sure I could beat this one if given another chance:
Dandelions and Barn, Vermont

Spring Cornfield, Hay Field, Clouds, Hartland Vermont
This is also near my house, but in another direction. Within a half mile of this, I’ve probably made well over a thousand exposures in all seasons. It’s quite a spot. This is my only really famous image though, and doubly famous now. The first brush of fame is that the Boston Athenaeum bought this print, and then chose to display it (I had three prints hanging in the show, out of the dozen or whatever that they bought) — displayed it in a show of “recent acquisitions” last summer. It was a really great show, and I was honored to be hanging in it. It’s an infrared exposure, but it looks quite natural, I think.

Spring Cornfield, Hayfield, Hartland Vermont

Printing Subtle Images — Harder Than it Might Seem

Four Morning Glories in Autumn

I’ve been printing a lot just lately. As I mentioned last week, I had a request from my senator’s office to send some prints to hang in their Washington DC office. So I’ve been printing for Bernie Sanders. He wants Vermont images. I’ve printed some of my most popular images, things I’ve printed a lot before. It’s gone well. But then I’ve been trying to push out some new work, as I always feel inclined to do in these circumstances. This printing has been harder than hard. I think sometimes people think a photographer just presses the shutter on the camera, click, and then to print you push a button, click again. Done. So easy. Who would pay for that?

I won’t talk about the camera and lens work, but I find that in some ways printing never gets easier, with some images. Indeed, as my aspirations grow, it just gets harder. I think in some ways the hardest of all are the moody, atmospheric images I’m working on a lot these days, which in some cases only have a relatively small area of sharp subject, and the rest are tones and subtle colors. I think that a more traditional landscape — everything sharp — is a whole lot easier. The detail and the “reality” of the subject distract a lot from other aspects of what is going on with tones and colors. Of course such a print still benefits from the work to get the tones all working. It is just more critical when the photo is more of a tone poem than a detail-subject.

I had been printing in the darkroom since the late 70s, and I got to be quite the craftsman after I took a couple of weeks of workshop given by John Sexton in 1982. He was working as Ansel Adams’ darkroom assistant at that time, and he taught us the craft as Ansel Adams was practicing it. Besides a lot of burning and dodging, paper choice and a lot of tweaking of chemistry were involved, and it took a long time to nail a final print in those days. I printed in the darkroom until about ’98, when I moved away from a darkroom and never had one of my own again.

At first, digital printing was even harder for me than darkroom printing. At first everything was out of control, and I couldn’t get a handle on it. I longed for the darkroom. Eventually I learned the characteristics of a handful of papers, how the ink works, most importantly calibration of monitor and printer profile. Still not easy. Sometimes pretty predictable. Sometimes surprisingly not so. I’ve spent quite a bit of time and expensive materials, but now I have a really nice print of this morning glory in autumn light on Canson Etching Edition paper.

I’ve been working on printing of the image above since mid-December, and I’ve just got prints I’m happy with today, finally. I’ll send one to Bernie.

A print, by being reflective, is a different kind of thing than glowing pixels on a monitor. The image above features some light coming through, the gold burst from the autumn foliage behind the top morning glory. I’ve got to get the paper to convey that sense. The colors are bright and vivid, but it’s tricky to keep it from looking like a cartoon. In some of my attempts it has been hard to keep it from being murky. This is a tricky one.

My first take on working on an image where color and tonal fidelity will usually be to try Canson Baryta paper. This was a complete failure for some reason. It was just too contrasty, and I couldn’t get the feeling to come across, even when reducing contrast in the file I fed the printer. Printing on more textured mat papers, like Canson Edition Etching opened the whole thing up better, less deep and made the light glow, but then there were other problems — color fidelity not as good, and also not a good “anchor” from the deeper tones. I find on some of my textured papers, even with a calibrated workflows, some colors get a little wilder and harder to control.

I had to make a file just for printing, and then tweak the file to get the print to work, a different file from what I display on the screen to look good. The goal I insist on is that the print and the image you see on screen will have the same impression.

Because I’m a masochist, I’m working on another one that is just as hard. I’m still not quite happy with the print of this one, but I’m working on it this afternoon. My target is to get it to work on Canson Rag Photographique, a smooth paper that is still distinctly papery, and which still conveys the open quality I’m looking for. Closing in on it I think.

New Beech Leaves, 2017

Photos Into A Museum Collection — Boston Athanaeum

On Thursday I went down to the Boston Athanaeum to meet with the wonderful curator there. She had asked me to bring 14 prints down, along with “my favorites.” Since I couldn’t bring about 10,000 prints of my favorite images down, or even all of the images I could print without too much trouble, I ended up bringing about another 10 down, ranging from pigment prints of scans of 1981 vintage 4 x 5 film from my first view cameras, to some images exposed relatively recently on mirrorless sensors with some excellent modern lenses. In the end, she settled on 11 prints to add to the permanent collection.

The photos are in their collection at this link.

We had a lot of really interesting conversations, but I think the most interesting aspect of the talks maybe had to do with time. The Athanaeum is a historical institution; they’ve been buying art for a long time. As a curator of 100,000 pieces, she lives with images of many times, all day. She says she walks around Boston, and she can also see those other times from her images. And the idea of acquiring my images is to grab me out of the present moment and add my images to this continuity as one representation of the current time. She told me that if I come back in 200 years I will find my work perfectly preserved and curated. I will try, but it’s hard to hold intentions over multiple lifetimes, as we all know.

It’s interesting for me, because most of those close to me will point out that I have a somewhat unusual sense of time. It gets weirder the more I meditate, I think. While I won’t deny that the damn clock ticks in a regular way, that’s not nearly as interesting as the way we relate to time, and to mind-time. Our experience doesn’t exactly have anything to do with the clock-tick, though maybe sometimes a little.

And it’s always been interesting in photography. I’ve written about this in my current version of the artist statement on the site as well as in previous and no doubt future blog posts.

My images in their collection are as follows:

New Ice, Rain, and Tree Reflections
New Ice, Rain, and Tree Reflections

Post Pond, Lyme NH, Mist, Hill and Melting Ice
Post Pond, Lyme NH, Mist, Hill and Melting Ice

Frost Flowers on Trout Brook into Post Pond Sunset
Frost Flowers on Trout Brook into Post Pond Sunset


Trout Brook into Post Pond Sunset, Mist


Post Pond, Mist After Sunset, Ice Melt (Note: This print is no longer on my site. Instead I am offering a vertical composition of a different exposure, here. Please contact me if you’d like the print that is in the Atheneum Collection.


Oak Leaf and Hemlock in Spring Ice, Vermont 2014



3 Trees, South Strafford, VT, 1981



Multifaceted Slope, Shadows, Barn, Vermont 2012


Old Barn, Spring Poplars, New Hampshire


Spring Cornfield, Hay Field, Clouds Hartland Vermont



Two Apples: Hudson’s Golden Gem