Digital BW, The Print

I find all that you have written strangely moving. It's so hard to ever predict what will infiltrate the unconscious and live there, shaping so much of what we do, so often without our awareness, so often in opposition to what we are conscious of.

I had the good fortune of becoming friends with Paul Caponigro while living in Maine. I got to visit his studio, check out his darkroom and look at many original prints, a lot of them early work. I had to confess that I had never been a huge fan, but by the time I left Maine I had become one, and that was because he taught me how to really look into his photographs, not in a direct way, but by being in his presence: from simply hanging out on the rocks in the harbor, talking about his other love, the piano, the weather, the people we both knew, or not talking at all. His life experiences and the manner in which he spoke about them on those afternoons made his photographs come alive for me in a way that I know will last forever and probably inform what I do whether I know it or not. 

And John Paul's work is so different. I, too, miss the profundity of it but it's clear that is there for many people.


Thanks for writing what you did. It's delicious food for thought and a good story!

Sarah





--- In DigitalBlackandWhiteThePrint@yahoogroups.com, C D Tobie <CDTobie@...> wrote:
>
> 
> On Oct 9, 2009, at 12:46 PM, john wrote:
> 
> > Paul Caponigro. Not in any way to be confused with his son.
> 
> I can't help but notice the degree of emphasis you use there...
> 
> I had a girlfriend in high school whose family's summer place as a  
> couple door's down from the Wyeth's. Her great aunt was Christina  
> Olson, as in "Christina's World". So as a young art student I was  
> steeped in Wyeth, but also in Caponigro. He shot a large number of  
> images of the Olson farm (which my girlfriend's family simply referred  
> to as "the family farm"), and printed many of them on early high  
> contrast B&W paper. Funny how we internalize that stuff, and its with  
> us for a lifetime.
> 
> A couple of years ago I won a photo competition. A lot of people sent  
> me congrats, often with comments, but the one that just floored me was  
> from our company's color scientist. Not the person I would expect  
> penetrating artistic analysis from. But he commented that he saw a  
> good deal of Wyeth in the image. Once he said it, of course, it could  
> not have been more obvious! That detailed, scratchy egg tempera hay in  
> Christina's world was clearly involved in my color, sharpness and  
> other decisions in processing that image, even though it was shot in  
> Tuscany, not Maine. Similarly, I can't process an image of weathered  
> wood, without those high contrast B&Ws of Caponigro's urging me  
> towards more contrast, and more texture! Can't say that his son John  
> Paul has effected me on that level, expect perhaps negatively; by  
> producing an aversion to symmetrical images produced by mirroring...
> 
> C. David Tobie
> Global Product Technology Manager
> Digital Imaging & Home Theater
> CDTobie@...
> 
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> Datacolor
> www.datacolor.com/Spyder3
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