About the series

 

This series of large-scale multiple-exposure photographs is inspired by Abstract Expressionism and visionary consciousness, and consist of densely-layered textures built up by taking many exposures of the same tree from several different angles, and combining them together in-camera. While Analytic Cubism combined multiple perspectives into a whole that often felt disjointed, these multiple-exposure photographs remove all barriers between subject and object (between us, the tree, and the sky), until the result reflects the underlying Oneness that we are all part of.

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The works also celebrate the cycle of the seasons, as I returned to photograph the same trees in winter, spring, summer, fall, and then back to winter again. In early 2012, after working for a year on my black-and-white Memoria photographs of bare trees in winter, I felt like a person reborn. Even though the trees were still bare, my creativity was already in full bloom, and I wanted to celebrate by photographing trees in the hills east of San Jose, California, where I had photographed the trees for years and they felt like old friends. As I stood in front of my favorite tree, I was struck by the brilliant contrast of the blue sky with the light and dark branches. I knew the photograph needed to be in color, and the result was “Multiple Vision #1”, the beginning of this series. 

 

Since my digital Hasselblad camera does not have the built-in ability to capture multiple exposures, I had to create my own method by leaving the shutter open for a long time and manually uncovering the lens for each exposure. Since I'm never sure quite what the result will be, the process is full of surprises and serendipity, just like the process of forming and finding memories. 

 

All photographs are archival pigment prints on the highly-textured Hahnemuehle William Turner paper, and are available at 20"x20", 40"x40", and 60"x60".

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