Zero Point

I enjoyed a week long printing workshop with John a few years ago where I learned many darkroom techniques that I continue to use today. He is a great printer and image maker and this show will be inspiring to all visual artists.

EXHIBITION, LECTURE, AND RECEPTION AT OSU
CORVALLIS, APRIL 6-29 - RECEPTION AND LECTURE APRIL 6

I am very pleased to announce that I will be having a retrospective exhibition of my photographs at Oregon State University in Corvallis, Oregon. This will be the “premier” installation of my traveling exhibition John Sexton: Thirty-Five Years of Photographs. The exhibition will run from April 6 through 29 in the beautiful Fairbanks Gallery at OSU. We are currently putting the finishing touches on this exhibition. I’m doing last minute work in the darkroom, and Anne and I are busy matting, framing, and crating the exhibition. There will be images from as early as 1973, along with some recently printed images from new negatives.

I will be presenting a lecture on Monday evening, April 6, at the LaSells Stewart Center at OSU, as part of the Visiting Artists and Scholars Lecture Program. The lecture will be at 7:00 pm. There will be an opening reception at 6:00 pm, prior to the lecture, and a book signing will follow the conclusion of the lecture. The reception and lecture are open to the public and the admission is free. Seating for the lecture is on a first come basis. Fairbanks Gallery and the Visiting Artists & Scholars Lecture Program are sponsored by the OSU Department of Art.

I look forward to seeing a number of friends and past workshop participants from the area on Monday, April 6. During my time on campus I will be visiting with OSU photography students.

For a photographer, a day like this is rare.  It feels like christmas all over again.  In preparation for my up coming Hawaii trip, I’ve acquired some new equipment to make botanical images and still lifes.  But I didn’t expect it to come all tonight!

A Hassebald 501CM dropping from the sky

I had actually previously ordered a 501CM from KEH in EX condition, however the film advance knob had clearly been over torqued (it was very loose) and there was a big gouge on the bottom on the camera body.  So I sent it back and traded up (for $50) for another 501CM in EX+ condition.  This camera body was very clean and obviously had hardly been used.  It was well worth the $50.  I also bought two very clean A12 camera backs and a beautiful 120mm T* CF Makro-Planar lens from KEH.

I have been lugging around a massive Manfrotto tripod for years to use with my LF equipment.  I finally decided to shed the beast and upgrade to a modern carbon fiber tripod.  After borrowing a friend’s FEISOL, I ordered a FEISOL Tournament CT-3342 tripod with their CB-50D ballhead.  This tripod tips the scale right at 1kg, and can easily support a 4×5 field camera or any ‘blad that might drop your way.

FEISOL Tripod inverted around the FEISOL CB-50D ballhead

This head and tripod were designed together so that the tripods legs can invert safely around the head without damaging the carbon fiber legs.  In this configuration the head and tripod (with 3 sections) is just under 2′ long.  The tripod construction looks first rate and the leg clamps are rubberize and very fast to release or tighten.  I tend to be very hard on equipment in the field so we’ll see how it holds up.  The tripod also came with a nice padded case, useful for traveling.

The new outfit!

I’m really looking forward to trying out this new equipment in some Hawaiian botantical gardens.

Three other willamette valley photographers (Jon Muyskens, Andrew Yip, and Jeff Conley) and myself joined together to create a booth at the Corvallis Fall Festival.  While we were accustom to showing our work at galleries, we knew little about participating in an outdoor arts festival.  Our biggest challenge was to design and build the booth.  There are many fancy ‘booth systems’ that artists can buy, however they are expensive and heavy, and we really didn’t know if we’d be doing this more than once.  So we set off to Home Despot and priced lumber and potential wall covering materials.

We settled on a making panels 3 feet wide by 8 feet high framed out with 2′ x 2’s in a truss design.  We then stretched thin gray outdoor carpet over the frames, stapling it in place.  The panels can then be connected together on site to make a longer wall using bolts, washers, and butterfly wing nuts.  This design worked very well in practice, was portable (the individual panels can easily fit in a small truck),  light weight, and cost far less that commercial booth systems - though it’s likely not as durable as metal framed display walls.

Booth wall frames mocked up without the carpet. The L-shaped wall on the right is made up of four panel frames bolted together.

Here Jon and Andrew are working to stretch the gray outdoor carpet tightly over one of the panels.  We found that numerous staples (about 2″ centers) were necessary to keep the carpet from sagging.  We also put a few staples into the front face of each panel to hold the carpet tighter to the frames.  If the staples are carefully placed in the grooves of the carpet they minimally mar the display surface.

Andrew and Jon are stretching and stapling the carpet on a panel.

Andrew and Jeff are finishing up a few last minute touches to the booth before show time.

A bad phone snap of some beautiful prints in our booth.

Two wonderful customers browsing our card wall

Because this was our first outdoor art festival show, this took a lot of effort to pull together.  However now that we have our lightweight portable booth ready to go, we may show up at another festival somewhere on the west coast (especially after the economy has recovered a bit).  If you stopped by our booth during the festival - thank you!

This is my new skeletal website which will primarily serve as a public container for my photographic galleries. I’m doing the development myself and the galleries will come on-line in fits and starts. Check back again, thanks! -Paul