Review: Eight Solos Part 3

Note: I do these reviews for my own personal education, I am hoping that by verbalizing my often confused thoughts : ) I can zero in on becoming a better photographer myself. All comments are directed towards photographs shown in a public gallery any negative comments are written in the spirit of suggestion and self improvement and are not meant as any kind of personal attack on the Artist.

Member: 1

I felt this member had the best overall work in this groups last show "Alberta". This time around although the work was still quite good I felt their was a drop in quality. It might be the second album syndrome, a group of musicians spends their lives writing songs for their first album and its a smash hit but later when they try to repeat those hits in album 2 their is an let down, they only had 1 year to do album 2 and could not repeat the quality. I think Member 1 might have suffered the same fate, his work in "Alberta" seemed to be a best of selection of images, this time around he had to rely on other images and their is a wow factor letdown because of that. The images are still pretty good but they are not great like the last show.

For this artist surprisingly there were some issues with matting as noted in the matting blog entry.

Member 1 had a few issues with bad print cutting (Kicking Horse River) and uneven print mat borders (Flooded Pines).

Best Images:

Pond Lillies, Parkland Country, 2006:

Really enjoyed this photograph found it sublime and beautiful, especially enjoyed the triangular shadows along the top edge. In my notes to describe this photograph I wrote the word JOYOUS, think it fits pretty well, this image is about the beauties and joys of the natural world.

I wish the paddies could have been a little sharper with more detail.

Templeton Cedar, Columbia Valley, 2006:

Large beautiful print with wonderful bright highlights. An unusual composition that works very well. A little bit more sharpness in the background areas would have helped, maybe in the future with 8x10 negative this will be possible.

Member: 2

Some very nice small prints from this artist. I found them all compositionally interesting and detailed. The small size was a bit of a detriment, maybe it was the gallery lighting but I found it hard to see deep into the picture, sort of had to have my nose 2 inches from the glass to see anything. I would also liked to have seen more modern work as the date listed was 1985, it made me wonder what this photographer had been shooting in the 23 years since these images were made!

The prints had nice tonality and very good detail in the snow which is hard to get (tried it myself and failed in the attempt). I would ease up a bit on the selenium toning as the pinkish hew dominated the image to much for my liking. Lets see some modern work next time.

Best Image:

Tranquil Sanctuary, 1985

Gorgeous small print filled with wonderful form and detail. I might have burnt down the snow on the top edge a tad.