Abstract Photography

Untitled, Unique photograph. Center panel from larger scale installation. Shot in the 20X24 format. (this measures about 20X20 inches) Ellen Carey, American artist and photographer. Ellen Carey resides in Hartford, Connecticut, and teaches at the Hartford Art School. She holds a B.F.A. from the Kansas City Art Institute, Missouri, and an M.F.A. from State University of New York at Buffalo. Her photographs have been exhibited at numerous galleries and museums, including the International Center for Photography, New York and the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts. She has received many grants from her home state of Connecticut as well as the Massachusetts Council of the Arts, New Works Grant, New York State Federation for Artists Grant; and a National Endowment for the Arts Award. Her photographs are in the permanent collections of The Art Institute of Chicago; the Baltimore Museum of Art; Brooklyn Museum of Arts; Chase Manhattan Bank; Coca Cola Corporation; Fogg Art Museum; George Eastman House; International Center for Photography; and the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, among others. Abstract photography, sometimes called non-objective, experimental, conceptual or concrete photography, is a means of depicting a visual image that does not have an immediate association with the object world and that has been created through the use of photographic equipment, processes or materials. Some photographers pushed the boundaries of conventional imagery by incorporating the visions of surrealism or futurism into their work. Man Ray, Maurice Tabard, André Kertész, Curtis Moffat and Filippo Masoero were some of the best known artists who produced startling imagery that questioned both reality and perspective. Both during and after World War II photographers such as Minor White, Aaron Siskind, Henry Holmes Smith and Lotte Jacobi explored compositions of found objects in ways that demonstrated even our natural world has elements of abstraction embedded in it. Beginning in the late 1970s photographers stretched the limits of both scale and surface in what was then traditional photographic media that had to be developed in a darkroom. Inspired by the work of Moholy-Nagy, Susan Rankaitis first began embedding found images from scientific textbooks into large-scale photograms. By the 1990s a new wave of photographers were exploring the possibilities of using computers to create new ways of creating photographs. Photographers such as Thomas Ruff, Barbara Kasten, Tom Friedman, and Carel Balth were creating works that combined photography, sculpture, printmaking and computer-generated images. Any boundaries that remained between pure artists and pure photographers were eliminated by individuals who worked exclusively in photography but produced only computer-generated images. Among the most well-known of the early 21st century generation were Gaston Bertin...

In the early 1970s, color photography was not really considered to be art by any standard. Mitchell Funk is one of the early trailblazers of color photography as fine art. In this 19...

Since its construction, Mitchell Funk has been chronicling the Twin Towers, of the World Trade Center. More specifically, he has been recording how light affects and transforms the two giant monoliths. Like us all, Mitchell was inspired by the formidable presence of the two buildings. Living in Brooklyn Heights with great views of lower Manhattan gave him a special advantage and opportunity to assemble some of the most iconic Twin Tower images ever taken. To Mitchell Funk, the Twin Towers, of the World Trade Center were the perfect synthesis of commerce and art. Most modern architecture is simply functional. Minoru Yamasaki's Twin Towers were in fact something quite radical. They were a steel and glass expression of Minimalism on the grandest scale in human history. Everything in the towers was stripped down to its essential quality with nothing extraneous added ….. except light. The way the buildings reflected light made them unique and inspired Mitchell to record them in color for 32 years. Although, the exterior was actually made of a very reflective blue/grey stainless steel the warm light of daybreak and sunset could change their color and transform them from buildings into and mystical monumental sculptures. With the help of the sun as a key player, Mitchell’s images of the Twin Towers progress from the mystical to the spiritual as they reflect the sun’s intense golden energy. Under these conditions, one could argue, that the Twin Tower housed the same type of divine energy as the adjacent churches. In the wake of the 9/11 tragedy, one could interpret Twin Tower sunset images differently. A sunset can be a symbol for the end of the day or simply The End. The 1969 image “Dead End” is a visual prognostication. The North Tower is under construction in the background and in the foreground, Mitchell has framed it between two street signs that read Dead End. In Mitchell’s Twin Tower photographs, he is not taking a tourist picture that says “here I am on the Brooklyn Heights Promenade...

This in-camera multiple exposure with colored gels is generations ahead of its time. It was taken 53 years ago and looks very contemporary today. Mit...

Psychedelic Portrait Multiple Exposure Zoom with Female Profile, This work is as fresh and contemporary-looking today as it was radically innovative when it was done in 1970 Signed...

This is a groundbreaking early example of negative color manipulated with color filters. Executed on 35mm film emulsion. It's a poetic and lyrical evocation of a fairytale landscape...

Unique dye destruction print Signed, titled, and dated, verso This artwork is offered by ClampArt, located in New York City. Price includes framing. Christopher Bucklow is a Britis...

Signed, dated, numbered 3/15 recto, printed later, other sizes available, unframed

Signature: signed and dated on lower right, numbered on verso, 3 /15 printed later, unframed, other size available . The genesis of color photography starts with color. Bright, bold...

Brooklyn Bridge and Old Man was done in 1969 decades before digital. the Artist uses exactor razor blades to scratch out color gel and then assembles them all together on a 35mm sli...

Multiple Exposure Zoom with Female Profile, This work is as fresh and contemporary looking today as it was radically innovative when it was done in 1970 Signed and dated on lower ri...

World Trade Center Tower 2 is still under construction in this very early example of how color photography can be true to it's namesake . Signed , dated lower right, Edition 2 /15 P...

Mitchell Funk. He was Color when Color wasn't Cool. Conceptualized and executed in 1971, when color photography was not recognized as fine art, this group of abstract, negative colo...