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| Alexandra Waterhouse-Hayward - 1978 |
There are words that when I hear them said or see them in print annoy me to no end.
Award-winning, at the end of the day, move forward, 99.9% pure, and those overused stunning and iconic.
I particularly despise the word upgrade which invariably means that whatever it is, it will be more complicated.
In this 21st century photographers and phone
photographers have abandoned the concept of Rembrandt lighting. Most Vermeers
are painted in window lighting that show of the same one side of face light and
the other dark. My portrait of Alexandra is an example of Rembrandt lighting.
What particularly upsets me is that the technology of the last century has been abandoned for the “better” technology of this one.
My mother used to tell me that anything framed is saved. In a frame going down my stairs I have these double portraits (they don’t both fit at the same time on my scanner) of 1978.
I went to visit a friend in San Francisco and I took with me an 8x10 print of my Alexandra in which I used Kodak b+w infrared film. Walking on Market Street I passed a place that made T-shirts. I walked in with my 8x10 and they made a T-shirt using a Xerox machine. Part of the output were these two lovely prints.They were about to throw them away but when I asked they gave them to me.
I think they are special. In this better and upgraded century I could not have stuff like that done again.
