Having had some experience of darkroom processes and photographic experiments as part of his degree course, John became excited about the prospect of investigating pinhole photography with his children as an educational activity. It soon became clear that, far from being a trivial curiosity, pinhole photography had great potential as a means of artistic expression. Even though he understands the processes involved, he is still frequently amazed at how an MDF box, some copper sheet and a few chemicals can combine to create such evocative images.
With exposure times ranging from two or three minutes to several hours, John sees pinhole photography as the perfect antidote to ‘instant’ digital photography, which, in many ways, short cuts the creative process. The time taken to make an exposure not only gives him the chance to properly look at what he is photographing, but for the subject itself to interact with the medium: Water flows like quicksilver, grass and leaves blur as they move in the breeze, people sometimes walk in and out of shot leaving ghostly traces. The pinhole captures everything in equal measure; there is no foreground or background and every part of the image is the subject.
The limited edition Fine Art Giclée prints exhibited here are each from a run of 50, individually numbered and signed on the reverse. The images are taken from his original paper negatives, converted into a digital format, and professionally printed on archival quality Hahnemühle Photo Rag (308gsm).
