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makers
our friend and neighbor cameron garrard works out of a backyard studio behind her house near downtown athens. cameron studied jewelry & metalwork at UGA and has since made jewelry and other things by commission out of this studio space. i love the diffuse light over her main work table and all of the textures and edges around...
to see more, visit www.eloquin.com
words & photographs by rinne allen
just outside of athens sits PBR...the piedmont bureau of reclamation. part of the oneta woodworks family, PBR has pile upon pile of old (but very useable) wood waiting to be turned into something special. a series of old buildings houses the whole operation, and a pecan grove and old-growth muscadine vines add some vegetative beauty; the whole landscape is a fitting backdrop for PBR's daily purpose of salvaging old lumber for furniture and interior spaces.
words & photographs by rinne allen
by rinne allen
Read Morealso at a world away, rebecca's son zack had a Monster Maker station. you were invited to sit and visit with him and he would then draw a monster for you. the monster was created from each person's "idea" of a monster, which made it really special and fun. and, the kids really got into it too.
(and did we mention that zack studied Manga in japan, so that only adds to the greatness!)
our friend emily hall is now officially making tin types. you may recall that emily had a successful kickstarter campaign. she went west this past spring and learned how to pour plates and is now making them in athens. it is a very special experience, watching her work...she was making them at A World Away, and then she came to our backyard last weekend to make more. here are some images, as well as some words that explain her process.
what do you call your process? I call my process as tintype. I make tintypes. The process that I am creating is technically called "aluminotype" which is a category that falls under wet plate collodion process. (Collodion refers to the emulsion process and the "tin", "ferro", "ambro", etc type refers to the medium.) I refer to my process as "tintype" not just because of the physical element but also the historical. Tin was known to be inexpensive in the the nineteenth century (i.e tin penny,etc) and it is a reference to this type of portraiture being cheap and readily available to all people. Tintypes were the first form of mass portraiture and I am inspired by that.. There is something alluring about the historical significance that it played in portrait photography. Although, now it is less available and less inexpensive, I want to acknowledge it as it was in it's original form.
when were you first introduced to the process? At my first/last Civil War reenactment in Perryville, Ky. I was there joining some friends on a documentary shoot for the Battle of Perryville and I came across an artist named Bob Szabo who was making beautiful plates for reenactors. I left wanting to learn how and I think I even wrote him a letter asking if I could watch him work, but never heard back and I put it in the back of my mind.. And then there was Sally Mann and her work with wet plate and I have always thought everything she did was so beautiful. But how do you aspire to be Sally Mann? So it just kinda sat in the back of my head for a while...
what made you want to learn how to do it? While working on an art project two summers ago with a dear friend in Portland, ME, we had an artist, Cole Caswell, make our tintype portraits. And that was the end of that. I hate having my picture made.. I'm the worst in front of a camera but when Cole handed me our portraits, that was it. I had to do it. I needed to make things that were this beautiful and haunting and powerful. I came home and bought a couple books, read blogs and then decided the best way to learn was with someone and there were a couple of people out there offering workshops and I figured out a way to get out there. And for me, "there" was Yosemite with Will Dunniway.
what was it like being out west learning the process? An amazing adventure. It was above all things, the most artistically rewarding thing I have ever done. I studied in Yosemite National Park with Will Dunniway and Bob Szabo (fate! destiny!) and that place with those people, was incredible. A majestic place with rich historical ties to collodion photography and standing in the valley of photo history trying to create a historical process was totally rad. And then being there with a purpose, with the emotional and financial support from my Kickstarter campaign, from loved one's and strangers, gave me a sense of important purpose. It wasn't just a fun photographic vacation.. but a mission. I studied with 8 other students who had traveled near and far to take place in the first ever wet plate workshop Yosemite had ever hosted. We stayed in the park in a rangers cabin. It was a lot like church camp with glacier formations, waterfalls, and wildlife. We spent each day out in the field making wet plates and learning from each other's mistakes and then came home exhausted to eat spaghetti and clean plates for the next day. Will and Bob are incredible teachers and artists. I met some amazing people and more importantly, a support group. If I have questions or need a hand I have people that are excited and willing to help me figure it out.. And I can't say enough about how beautiful Yosemite is. If you have never been.. you should go. And look at Carl E Watkin's work too.
what is the biggest challenge with this type of photographic process? My inexperience. The temperamental nature of the chemistry. Not being able to control the sun, which you need to make plates.
what is your favorite thing about this process? The beauty. Even my mistake plates are more beautiful (to me) than my properly exposed 35mm or 120 mm prints. It is so different from my commerical work. Every plate takes on its own profile that is part design and part mystery. They are magical and haunting and extraordinarily original. No two plates are ever the same. Ever. The only way to reproduce is by taking a photo of the original. Each has it's own fingerprint and in a digital world, where everything is mass produced and multiplied, something that is not only hand crafted, but truly one of a kind, is rare and worthwhile.
thanks, emily, for your time and for the inspiration!
words by emily hall . questions & photographs by rinne allen
