Gary Blackman's exhibition of magnificent digital photographs ''Late Entry'' at the Brett McDowell Gallery is over as you read this. No matter.
Because of the miracle of digital technology you can see most of the images at the gallery's website: brettmcdowellgallery.com. Indeed you might suppose this is their natural medium whereas the large prints on the gallery's walls represent them at a remove, mere husks of their natural selves. But you would be wrong.
At the opening I was struck by how uncontrived they seem, how apparently spontaneous and candid, while at the same time exhibiting numerous signs of careful composition and contrivance.
I wondered how was that done? And they are the opposite of cold and calculated but exhibit little of chiaroscuro, that play on the shading between white and black often emphasising the latter, which produces the moody effect in many photos.
Born in 1929, Blackman has been interested in art from an early age. He has been a painter, draughtsman and printmaker but made his career in pharmacology at the University of Otago.
He took up photography many decades ago and has long been interested in contemporary developments and the modern movement as these have manifested themselves in architecture, interior design and graphic design, as well as the cascading technological changes which have affected them all.
His work is consistently graceful, elegant, understated and sometimes numinous, exhibiting a kind of glowing universality captured from the most unlikely sources. The exhibition was warmly reviewed by James Dignan (ODT, 2.5.13) who noted Blackman is not as well recognised as he should be. I can only agree.
I put some questions to Blackman who has graciously and carefully explained some things. He prefers ''the character and presence'' of the print to its online manifestation but acknowledges that ''at high resolution on the newer screens, online viewing can become an arresting and seductive experience - just different''.
He points out that in the past a ''latent image'' was captured, used to make a negative and from that a positive print. The negative was kept as the primary source to make future prints.
Digital cameras capture an image on a sensor in digital code stored on a memory card as a digital ''image file''. This is then used to make the prints we see in the gallery, with some control necessary as with the earlier technology to ensure the desired result. The print as hard copy is Blackman's preferred way of presenting the image.
Regarding the tonal range, Blackman chooses an exposure which retains detail in both the lightest parts of the image and the darkest. It is the presence of the detail which ensures the quality he likes. New Plymouth Headstone is an example at the lighter tonal end of the spectrum and Iron Profile, Wellington is at the darker.
In Wellington Cafe we see a waitress going about her work. It's a candid shot with her torso cropped and blurring indicates she's in motion. What is remarkable is the serpentine line of her back and one leg is exactly echoed by the curving back of a bentwood chair. And the inner line of her other leg is similarly paralleled by the outer strut of a spindle back chair.
How much of this is luck and how much contrivance?
It's certainly a bit of both. Blackman was there in the cafe with his camera and had noticed interesting things going on between the pattern of the waitress' dress, the floor tiles, certainly the chair legs and other things not visible in the image.
He had taken some shots trying to make sense of what he was seeing and had his camera to his eye when the waitress approached the next table and assumed the posture we see. She is partly blurred because of a slow shutter speed.
There was some preparation but also the luck of the moment. Blackman emphasises it wasn't ''a cold analytical exercise in composition''.
That is certainly clear. The image is fresh and spontaneous. But the photographer's experience with making and finding patterns, not to mention with digital technology, also contributed to the sparkling result.
There are fleeting, reflected images captured in Mary Newton Gallery, Wellington, and Rakaia Bridge, for example. They appear like holograms floating over others to make layered palimpsests of dissolving imagery.
They are momentary optical effects but hint at things of mystery, to do with physics of course, but also memory. The threads of pattern, memory and spontaneity weave through the images to wonderful effect.
A selection of the prints is still at the gallery. I recommend a pilgrimage.
Peter Entwisle is a Dunedin curator, historian and writer.
