Be sure to bookmark our store as we are adding new work weekly and there will always be something new to see.

Our new store

About Matthew Magruder:

"Creativity has always been one of the most important things in my life. Ever since childhood I've wanted to create things. Art was ignited in me most prominently in college in the form of painting. I discovered and began pursuing photography with a 35mm camera about 4 years ago and was quickly hooked by the large format bug. I've spent the last 2+ years shooting large-format negatives in the Texas Hill Country (from 4x5" to 7x17"). I began exploring old abandoned areas, gardens, urban landscapes, and the like since I started photography, always feeling these places have an infinite array of potential photographs. I began working in 8x10" and, most recently, in the 7x17" banquet camera format. I feel at home with these formats and the contact printing processes, which I believe allows me freedom to capture the often unnoticed beauty that surrounds us. I find I've rarely shot a single negative with a person present in it, yet I feel people and their existence are one of the most influential aspects of the images I choose to capture. I feel there is no better way for me create images than through hand-crafted contact prints, whether it be a toned Van Dyke Brown print or a Palladium print. Through experimenting and learning, I've found these processes to be the most successful and beautiful manner in which I can express the infinite beauty I see in the world that surrounds us."

Matt's personal website.

About Joe Freeman:

I was born in southern New Jersey in 1981. It was the beginning of my senior year of high school in 1998 that I really began to take an interest in photography. Throughout the year it was becoming more apparent, through winning competitions and exhibiting and the overall feeling of fulfillment I had while photographing, that photography as an art, was going to be my life’s work. Not satisfied with 35mm or even medium format image quality, I began photographing exclusively with a 4x5 (only 8 months after my formal introduction to the medium) trying to get closer to the print quality of Edward Weston and Ansel Adams. After high school I majored in photography at the Art Institute of Boston. It was here that I was introduced to the idea of contact prints on silver chloride paper serving as the final image. I sold my 4x5, stopped making enlargements, bought a 5x7, and have solely been making contact prints ever since. After leaving college I sold the 5x7 and bought an 8x10. Developing sheet film in pyro and silver chloride paper in amidol, I was quick to begin construction on a contact printing darkroom. While researching the best ways to do so, I came across the work of Michael Smith and Paula Chamlee. Convinced that they could give me further understanding into contact printing with the materials I was using, I attended their workshop during the fall of 2002. I’ve since traveled with them to Baja California and was hired as their full time assistant from the summer of 2003 to the spring of 2004. During July - September 2004 I had my first major solo exhibition at the Paul Paletti Gallery, Louisville, KY’s preeminent photography gallery; where more than 50 of my prints can still be viewed. I’m currently living in southern Jersey preparing for a group show at the Rockville Arts Place in Gaithersburg, MD to go on display at the beginning of 2006.

Be sure to bookmark our store, as we are adding new work each week and there will always be something new to see.

Our new store

About Susan Huber:

Susan has worked with passion and determination for over twenty years, creating unique large-format photographs that demonstrate her fascination with the strength, longevity, and secrecy of the natural world, and the ways the human environment interacts with this world. Her favorite locations are the Columbia River Plateau in Washington State and the Badlands of Alberta. Not only is she attracted by their grandeur and natural beauty, she is also inspired by the history behind the old transport routes and the names of remote locations in a land vulnerable to the effects of dam development and mining interests.

At the same time that she began visiting the Columbia River Plateau, she became involved as a field volunteer for the Royal Tyrell Museum in Drumheller, Alberta, participating in the excavation of a large Centrosaurus dinosaur bone bed in the area. Working her section of the ancient bone bed stirred her imagination to ponder the fantastic creatures that once roamed the sediments. Early in her photography career, she was fortunate to study with photographer Robert Dawson while he was co-director of the Great Central Valley Project. It was partly due to Dawson's influence that she began to develop a significant interest in the way water affects the land, from diversion projects to protecting riparian habitats.

She enjoys nothing more than climbing into her VW camper and searching out new places to photograph, capturing images that most people never have the opportunity to see. Each photograph represents the cumulative effect of the people she has met, the places she finds compelling, and the precise moment that she is inspired to capture. Susan has a Bachelor of Science in Physical Therapy from CSUF (Fresno, CA). She has studied fine arts under Robert Dawson and has participated in workshops with Henry Gilpin, Mark Klett, Linda Connor, Bruce Barnbaum, Jay Dusard, and Craig Richards. Susan lives on Salt Spring Island, British Columbia, Canada.

About Patrick Kolb:

Combining a love for the natural environment with his photography, Patrick has been exploring the West for the last decade and a half with a large-format camera, the last four years with an 8x10. He believes the AZO contact print from a large-format negative has been the final step in bringing his vision and his craft together. A great deal of effort goes into making each image and, done right, it takes on a energy of its own as both a photograph and an art form.

Mostly self-taught, he credits three days spent traveling, photographing, and looking at photos with Morley Baer with infusing his work with a sense of history and an appreciation of the tradition of the contact printing process. A recent workshop with Michael Smith and Paula Chamlee confirmed his proficiency using the AZO/Amidol process.

These days, if not in his darkroom in Portland, Oregon, Patrick and his wife will most likely be traveling back roads in their van searching out new locations and new friends.

The images of Joe Freeman and George Provost will highlight an upcoming group show at the Metropolitan Center for the Visual Arts in Gaithersburg MD. It will be the inaugural show for the 2006 season and is curated by Paul Paletti from Louisville, KY's Paul Paletti Gallery. Three other photographers (Jim Shanesy, Scott Killian, and Steve Sherman) are also featured in the show. The exhibit runs from January 8 to February 4 at Metropolitan Center for the Visual Arts, 9300 Gaither Rd., Gaithersburg, MD. The opening reception (everyone welcome!) is on Sunday, January 8, from 3pm - 5pm. Call (301) 869- 8623 for more information.

Susan Huber

Susan Huber's images will be included in a prestigious exhibition of platinum prints during January-March 2006 in Banff, Alberta at the Peter Whyte Gallery. Alan King and three other photogravure practitioners are also featured.

Matt Magruder

Matt Magruder’s work is being featured January 6 to February 26 in the entryway of the Umlauf Sculpture Garden/Museum, 605 Robert E. Lee Road, Austin, TX. He has been scheduled to give a lecture on February 1 about his work and the show.

Umlauf Garden link

Christian Nze is offering two workshops in March. The first is scheduled March 11-12 and covers platinum printing; the second is March 18-19 and is a Cyanotype - Vandyke workshop. Both take place at Vire, France, during the "Mois de la photo de Vire." To sign up or get more information, contact Christian at cnze@club-internet.fr

Ray Bidegain

On May 19-21, 2006, Ray Bidegain is teaching a workshop in conjunction with the Portland Photographers Forum. It is entitled "The Fine Art of Platinum Printing with Ray Bidegain."

More information

Please have a look at this issue's special-offer prints on our website.

Special-offer Prints