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Statement for COMPOSITED NEIGHBORHOODS

In this project I'm using intensively layered photographs to do abstracted explorations of the

built environment.  I seek out canonical features — repeated structures in an urban

landscape, common elements of a city grid, typical houses in a neighborhood, characteristic

details of a district — comprehensively photograph them, and combine the results digitally to

develop a composite view of the subject.

This work relates to my longstanding artistic interests in formal repetition, pattern, and

geometry; in the tension between representation and abstraction inherent in photography;

and in how we recognize and visually understand the iconic, the typical, and the archetypal.

In making the work, I've also been delighted to discover rich and beguiling textures in pictures

that are nominally about bold, graphical, iconic subjects.  I'm drawn to both texture and icon,

but it's not usually straightforward to make photographs relating to both.  The texture in these

pictures comes directly from the texture (literal, and figurative) of the neighborhoods, so the

pictures are as much “about” texture as they are “about” the nominal subjects.

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Statement for CRANES + CONTAINERS

The Port of Oakland is both hard to miss and easy to overlook.  The sheer looming

physicality of the giant cranes and the stacks of containers, awesome in person, becomes

part of the background when seen from the freeway or a seat on the train, or when passed

en route to some sightseeing destination.

But the containers and cranes inspire me; I visit them often on my photographic mission to

find enigmatic isolated details and unexpected overlooked beauty in the real world.  They

provide rich raw material -- patterns, textures, geometry, visual rhythm -- for my

preoccupations as a photographer.

Since I also design machines for a living, the built and manufactured environment in general

is alive for me.  I'm endlessly fascinated with how things work, how they behave

mechanically, how they express themselves as designed objects, and what roles they

perform in contemporary civilization.

The modern containerized waterfront particularly intrigues me as a place that is dependent

on both highly engineered machines and highly skilled people.  The objects and the

landscape reflect both of these imperatives.  The environment is designed to serve both the

machines and the humans, though at starkly different scales.

The port is a wonder of the modern world, hidden in plain sight.

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Statement for INTENTIONAL BLURS

This blur series is drawn from a cross-section of my photographic work over the past several

years.  The blurs in these pictures result from factors including camera motion, manipulation

of depth of field, and reflections from transparent and translucent materials.  I use blurs both

for expression (communicating a sense of motion, for example) and for abstraction (making a

photograph that exists on its own terms, not simply as representation).  Creating a blur

picture is occasionally a release of control in making a photograph; more often, though, it's a

precise tool in itself, one more method for carefully observing the world.

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In general, my photographic preoccupations involve such matters as formal issues of

geometry, pattern, repetition, and rhythm; bold graphic impact in 2D space; and enigmatic

isolated details and unexpected overlooked beauty in the real world.

I also design machines for a living, so the built and manufactured environment in general is

alive for me.  My engineering point of view informs my photographic eye in terms of what to

shoot and how to present it.  My overall goal is to abstract out pieces of the human-built

enviroment and create images that inspire observers to see something they've overlooked or

take a fresh look at something familiar.

 

Artist’s statement(s)

 

About me

 

I've been taking pictures since my parents handed me an Instamatic to use on a family trip

when I was seven.  I kept shooting and began to learn my way around the darkroom in high

school and college, but drifted away from actively pursuing photography when engineering

coursework and the rest of life started elbowing out more open-ended creative pursuits.

Technology helped me find my way back to photography.  I started using a film scanner in

2001 and discovered it was true: I could have a darkroom on the Mac in the corner of my city

apartment.  I started re-learning what I could do with images, what I wanted to photograph,

how I really saw things and what that meant.

Today I pursue photography alongside a career as an exhibit developer at Lawrence Hall of

Science, where I design machines that children and families use as they explore science.

 

Contact me at info at allanayres.com.

See some of my pictures at JPG Magazine.

Check out my baby and child portrait business, Sproutshots.

 

Links

 

Allan Ayres

 

I’m an engineer, exhibit developer, and photographer in Oakland, CA.

 

Prints are available

 

In the real world, my pictures live as color and black-and-white Lambda prints ranging from

11x11 to about 15x25.  I typically frame images in black wood frames with white or black

archival mats (depending on the image), but I'm also happy to supply photographs as prints

only.  Please see the news page for information about where I'm currently showing and/or

contact me for pricing and availability.