Digital BW, The Print

Greetings list members,

I wanted to offer my congratulations as well as my impressions and 
observations regarding Paul Roark's one-man photography show
which is being exhibited at the Elverhoj Museum of History & Art in 
Solvang, CA from June 11 to August 14, 2003. If you live in the 
southern or central California areas and have the time, it would be 
well worth your time and effort to see this remarkable collection of 
fine-art images. The show features approximately 40 of Paul's
black and white landscape photos and includes both silver/gelatin and 
carbon pigment inkjet prints. Both the warm tone and neutral ink sets 
were used. Having both silver prints and inkjet prints, side-by-side 
to compare was very enlightening for me. Having made silver prints 
myself for the last 30 years, I know what a good silver print looks 
like and Paul's silver prints in this show are very good. But
what really grabbed my attention were his carbon prints. They are 
absolutely incredible images, some of the best I've ever seen - 
anywhere. They possess a range of subtle and delicate tonalities not 
often seen in even the best silver/fiber prints. They have rich, 
deep, powerful blacks and a level of detail in the shadows that are 
seldom seen in any print, be it silver of carbon. They all have very 
fine and sharp detail in both highlight and shadow that does not 
diminish when one takes a close, "in my face" look. There
were no "dots in the highlights," no noise in the shadows, no
artifacts, no imperfections of any kind. They were quit simply, 
perfect in my humble opinion. Aesthetically, I felt they were well 
composed and conceived. In general they evoked some pretty strong 
emotional responses in me, and made me homesick for the high mountain 
wilderness of my home state of Colorado. These images certainly 
represent the "state of the art" in B&W inkjet printing and
are examples of what is possible when talented artistic vision is 
combined with a new and exciting technology.

On a personal note, I enjoyed meeting and talking with Paul in 
person. He was very approachable and spoke with great excitement and 
enthusiasm about his work and the future of this venture we are all 
traveling together. In summary, we in this community are fortunate to 
have a pioneer such as Paul out there blazing the trail for others to 
follow.

Thanks for all your good works Paul and congratulations.

Sincerely,

David R. Spielman
Santa Barbara, CA