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Looking back to images of the future Sun,
Sep 19, 2004 For Quinn Jacobson, photography was losing its appeal. As technology made it easier to capture or create perfect images, it also took away the challenges that made it exciting. Digital
cameras and computers -- which he is grateful to use on the job as
a photographer at Hill Air Force Base -- just weren't working for
him in his pursuit of fine art. "Yes, you're behind a camera, and, yes, you're making choices and selections on light and lenses, but I see this as a kind of crippling, of not really paying attention -- I see this kind of dumbing down of image-making," he said, making motions as if taking a series of quick photos. "Photographers say, 'I'll get something, and if I don't, I'll do something in Photoshop' -- I'm guilty of it, too. . . . It kind of crippled me as a photographer. It kind of stopped me from seeing." Jacobson, a Riverdale resident, also worried about the longevity of digital photos. "I want my images to be around in 150 years. I'm not sure that digital images will be. The way they're changing all the time, it's kind of scary where it's going," he said. "Are my digital images going to be around in even 50 years?" Instead
of looking for the next great invention to reignite his passion, Jacobson
looked to the past. "That's a 50-pound camera -- if I want to change the composition, I've got to really think about it. This is a 20-second exposure, and this is a one-hour process to make a photograph. I really have to think about this stuff," he said. Expert tutors Collodion photography was introduced in 1851. Some of the most famous images were made by Civil War-era photographer Mathew Brady and his crew. Making a collodion image is not easy, and the technique is not known to many. Jacobson estimates there are less than 100 people in the world today doing wet-plate collodion photography, and only a handful of fine art photographers in the United States. So, he followed his passion to a studio back East. In the spring of 2003, he trained for a week with experts France and Mark Osterman in Rochester, N.Y. "I had a personal, one-on-one tutorial in wet-plate, which was very good because to get into this stuff is not easy," said Jacobson. "That kind of jump-started me, and it took me probably six or eight months when I got back here, after the training, to get set up to do it." First, he had to get a camera and lens, valued at around $4,000. He ordered the replica cherrywood camera from a craftsman in New Jersey. Then Jacobson had to practice. "This is very technique-driven. If you don't have the technique down, you don't make an image," he explained. "There are very specific conditions you have to have: the temperature, the light, the chemistry. All these conditions have to be just right, and on top of that, your technique has to be just right on, or you're not going to make the image. It's very temperamental and sometimes bewildering, but the end result is very fascinating to me." Making art Actually, Jacobson's interest in collodion photography goes beyond fascination. "I've got to admit that the first time I had success, I was so obsessed and so focused, that's all I lived for -- to get to the point where I could shoot and process a plate." Jacobson's camera is a replica, but the lens he uses is the real thing, made in Paris in 1864. "It's a portrait lens, so you can imagine the portraits that that's shot over the years -- it's 140 years old," he exclaimed. "I use this because of the quality. The glass is off, you'll see the aberrations in it, so it gives that 19th-century appearance, but with the modern subjects." Jacobson doesn't use old-fashioned technology and equipment to create old-fashioned pictures. He's not interested in reliving the past. "I'm not really after the 19th century. I'm after some of the aesthetic of the 19th century, but I'm not a Civil War re-enactor; I'm not what traditionally people associate this with. I'm using this process because of its aesthetic quality, because of this dreamy, revealing quality that it has." What he believes it reveals is character. And he's especially interested in exploring the difference between social identity and individual identity -- how society sees people versus how they see themselves. Nonconformists For his master of fine arts degree Jacobson is working on collecting images of people he identifies as nonconformists. "If I sat a businessman down here in a suit, a Wall Street guy, it would probably be interesting, maybe this might reveal something about him, I don't know, I could explore that," he said. But he'd rather explore blue-collar workers, musicians, artists and marginalized people. "When I come in contact with someone, or I meet them and I talk to them, I know that they're a nonconformist -- whether they know it or not. ... Those are the subjects I like to photograph. It's not about exploitation, it's about exploration," he said. "I want to be able to explore their lives, and this allows me to do it in a very unique, and I think artistic, way as well -- not just documentary, because we're not really talking about truth here, we're talking about impressions." When the photographer sees a potential subject, he introduces himself and his work. But it's not easy to get them to sit for a portrait. Many are suspicious of his motives and assume that he's trying to sell them something. That wasn't the case with Dan Solis. Jacobson walked into Solis' downtown Ogden tattoo business looking for a subject, and Solis volunteered immediately. "I was just totally ecstatic about doing it," Solis said. "I'm not the most handsome person, but I love being in front of the camera. And when he came down -- I just really believe in things happening for reasons." Jacobson brought samples of his work. As a skin artist who specializes in portraits, as well as someone with an interest in photography, Solis was curious. Not knowing the photography was anything other than regular film, he couldn't figure out how Jacobson got that particular look. Preparing the glass He soon found out. In Jacobson's garage studio, the photographer explained every step of the process as he made Solis' portrait. First, he ran a smoothing stone around the edges of an 8-by-10-inch plate of glass that he had cut earlier. Then he cleaned the plate with a mixture of calcium carbonate, grain alcohol and distilled water. "This is the most boring part of the process, but it's one of the most important, because if your glass is not clean, your collodion doesn't stick and you'll have peeling problems," Jacobson said. Holding the glass plate by one corner, he carefully poured collodion onto the plate and tilted it at various angles to spread the runny concoction of gun cotton, ether, alcohol and iodides over the surface. After dripping the excess collodion back into its container, Jacobson quickly flicked the plate in the air several times to make sure it was coated evenly. "Stick your finger on the back of that plate," he invited his subject. "Feel how cold that is? Ice, ice cold. That's ether evaporating off." Solis was also invited into the darkroom to watch as the plate was dropped into a bath of silver nitrate. Hold still! While the plate soaked in the silver bath for three minutes and 45 seconds, Solis was positioned in front of the camera. He stripped off his jacket to show off his gold jewelry and his tattoos. Then Jacobson pulled the plate, inserted it into the back of the camera and was ready to shoot. "I'm going to make a 20-second exposure of you, so you're going to have to be rock solid," he warned. "That's all right," Solis replied. "You'll do it, I know you will, man. I know you will. We're going to make a nice plate," the photographer said. Then it was back to the darkroom, where the plate was developed with iron sulfate, held under running water to stop development, and then fixed in potassium cyanide. In spite of the chemicals, some of which are monitored substances, Jacobson says it's not too dangerous if you're careful. "This photography took place for 50 years, every single day," he said, noting that the biggest danger is mixing the chemicals, especially if you like to imbibe. "Photographers in little dark tents in the 1850s and '60s would reach over and think they're going to take a drink of their Everclear, and they'll hit their potassium cyanide and drop dead right there in the tent." Disappearing tattoos The jewelry was first to appear during the developing; every small piece of gold chain on Solis' neck could be seen in detail. But there was something that couldn't be seen -- the tattoos. There was only a hint of the outline of a deep flame-shaped tattoo on his upper arm. "It's weird how it picks all that up, and yet, where I'm covered with tattoos, it's gone. It's almost like I've got some kind of makeup on my body," Solis said. Jacobson knew the tattoos weren't going to show up. "I used to regret that (the photographs) didn't show tattoos, because I wanted to photograph people -- sleeves and full-body kind of stuff -- and I was really excited about doing that. Now I'm kind of thinking, after doing it, it's interesting that it doesn't." Tattoos are only skin deep, and that's what Jacobson's project is about -- exploring people in a deeper way. "I don't know that I'm that concerned with the tattoos. I'm more concerned with that expression," Jacobson said. "Maybe the image realizes that, too ... because you know what, there's no other photograph in the world that's going to make your portrait like that -- it's just not going to happen." Jacobson believes Solis' tattoos didn't show up because they are bluish-green in color -- although he hasn't had much more luck with other tattoo colors, either. "It's a very different spectrum of light it uses, and it's a process of going through to see what works and what doesn't," Jacobson said. Blue jeans and blue skies also appear as neutral colors in this type of photography, and reds look almost black. Interpreting results Jacobson said Solis' expression in the portrait gave him the look of a warrior. "Look at how deep and rich, that's what I'm talking about," he said. "It goes beyond just him; it's going way down deep into him. This tonality, and the way this process sees people, it exudes this whole ancestry. It's like you were plucked out from 140 years ago. You may look like your great-great-grandfather or somebody way back when." Solis sees a modern warrior in the photo. "The look is also determined, but I think if you really look at it, I think you get to find out that I've, at some time, struggled. And I have, to achieve to where I am now," he said. "I can look back now and I can see that I'm serious -- I'm serious about life, period. But I think that I would also show in that picture that I'm an achiever as well. That's what I see when I look at myself now, in that pose right there." A satisfying art A few more plates were made, and both photographer and subject left the studio happy with the results of their work. "I'll tell you now that there is nothing, as far as I know of, that compares to that. Period. Just to even be here and see it happen right here before my eyes was awesome," Solis said. Replied Jacobson: "And that's what I want all of my sitters, I want everyone, to experience. That's the connection with me, too. It's not just me making the images, it's the subject, it's us interacting. That's important." And the photographer was glowing with passion for his craft. "Digital photography, traditional photography, flatten the landscape, photographically, for me," said Jacobson. "But this gives me all kinds of character and valleys and peaks that I can explore and go through visually, and I don't get that anywhere else -- so this really opens that whole avenue up for me. "It's
just wonderful. I can look at these things forever." |
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