Photography began as a somewhat mysterious science two centuries ago, used – primarily – to record images of individuals and events with a camera. Over the past 60 years, it’s evolved into an everyday means for the average person to capture those same images – and many more. Today we spend some time with a professional photographer and learns how the world of advanced technology is moving the art of his craft into a whole new frame.
Photography for me – like many - began with my first Kodak instamatic camera.
But the origins of photography date back thousands of years to when Chinese philosopher Mo Di and Greek mathematicians Aristotle and Euclid described a pinhole camera. Basically, that’s a light-proof box with a small hole in one side. Light from a scene passes through this single point and projects an inverted image on the opposite side of the box.
It took the contributions of various people from several countries to arrive at the images Matthew Brady brought to the world during the 19th century. Considered the father of photojournalism, Brady’s documentation of the Civil War delivered photography to every American home via publications like Harper’s Weekly. The founding of the Eastman Kodak Company in 1889 eventually placed the ability to do what Brady once did into the average American’s hand.
More than a century – and numerous technological innovations- later, the art of photography is still evolving.
Ray Tysdal is a fine art photographer best known for his striking black and white images of buffalo and other wildlife. His work is in the tradition of those who came before him…people like Matthew Brady, Edward Weston and Ansel Adams. Notwithstanding his reluctance to move out of his comfort zone, Tysdal has done just that by learning to incorporate his computer into his art. The results were on display at The Dahl Arts Center recently in a show called “Old Dog, New Tricks”.
“I’ve been working on this particular show for about three years,” Tysdal explains. “I was looking for something different finally found something different. And it’s basically a recycling and a reexamination of a lot of the old images I’ve done…reinventing myself as an artist, and realizing that photography needs to step out of its historical past and move into more creative lights to continue as a creative medium."
Sitting before a small group of photography enthusiasts gathered at The Dahl, Tysdal offers some first-hand insight into how he uses his PC and the PhotoShop program to create unique art from his camera images. Just what that process is depends on your perspective.
“He takes liberties with photography in a way that makes abstract..isms…come to life in a way that isn’t just at the artist’s hand,” observes Callie Tysdal.
Callie, who is Ray’s daughter, happens to be in the audience for her father’s presentation. As an art history major, Callie offers an academic view of her father’s new works.
“He’s working not only with what his mind can see but what nature can give him and create something that’s somewhere in between,” Callie continues. “And you can’t quite say that it’s all artificial, ‘cause it’s not.”
For example, Tysdal begins his seminar by showing a photograph of snow, ice and water he took near Pactola Lake the day before, As Tysdal begins to explore the image with his PhotoShop program – expanding here, zooming in there – an entirely new image emerges.
“Also, I think him and I have had some discussion over does it exist or does it not,” says Callie. “It’s all digital now…so he gets into some more philosophical debates about what art is and what it isn’t.”
Sounds like a discussion the ancient Greeks and Chinese might have appreciated. And that’s just where Tysdal wants to go with his new work.
“My intention is to put an image out there that makes you, the viewer, figure it out,” Tysdal comments.
One indication of the broad range of Tysdal’s new work is shown by its impact on Derek Smith, a local graffiti artist…who doesn’t use computers or photography for his images.
“It’s been something I can relate to,” says Smith. “With him being able to do the creation right then and there.as we call it in the graffiti world ‘burning’…right then and there in that moment where it’s…defining yourself, as in making the image right then and there in that moment as spontaneous as possible. That’s the same thing holds true in graffiti culture“
Art student, graffiti artist, radio journalist – each takes something different away from Ray Tysdal’s images. And that, he says, is what makes it art.
