November 10, 2003

Yesterday I went to a slide show presentation of photographer Bruce Barnbaum, at the Central Oregon Environmental Center in Bend.

I had known some, if not much, of his work before hand, but the trigger to go was a big thumbs-up by a friend of mine who had attended one of his workshops and raved about his imagery. She told me Bruce had studied with Ansel Adams, and had worked extensively with another fine black & white photographer, the much-admired John Sexton.

And yet, the evening had two decidedly polar opposites - one that left a bad taste on my palate for the human ego; the other that left the photographer in me inspired.

Truthfully though, I almost walked out of the presentation after Bruce's exhausting half-hour intro that was really little more than a pseudo-funny, thinly-veiled sales pitch - and was all about me, me, me, and me.

How his book publisher screwed him. How he got inspired for this series of four books he was putting together. Oh, and btw - you can buy the first one in the series right here for 80 bucks. And since I'm such an important artist, but at the same time a charitable guy, you can also buy one of my 16 x 20 prints for only 750 bucks, instead of the usual 900.

Gimme a break, Bruce. They weren't even beautiful Gelatin Silver prints, just ordinary darkroom prints. And let's face it: no unmatted, unframed, 16 x 20 print is worth 900 bucks if the artist is still alive ...

He did however sort of redeemed himself as the slide show started. His imagery was truly exquisite. Astonishing curves, patterns, and designs emerged from ordinary locations and objects such as fern, rock canyons, and ancient cathedrals, teased onto the negative by lots of patience, a critical eye and an obviously enormous amount of time spent in the darkroom.
Most of his photographs had captured a mystical quality of light (by means of 3 - 15 minute exposures) rarely showcased by less patient photographers.

And yet I left the presentation the moment the slide show ended, and with a rather bitter taste towards Bruce, the person. In the end, that also really diminished the impact of his photographs, no matter how beautiful they were to look at.

In contrast though, I remembered a slide show by Galen Rowell I attended a few years ago - how Galen had lost no time dwelling on himself or his achievements, but rather passionately talked about the things he deeply cared about: photography as a tool for helping preserve the world's last wild places, and spurring the fight for freeing his beloved Tibet. His narration of the images in the slide show were all put in these contexts, making them (aside from being beautiful works of art) so very meaningful.

That evening I lingered on, bought one of his books (for 35 bucks), had it signed, and left the event with my mind and heart brimming with Galen's infectious enthusiam about the need to preserve the environment for future generations.

And that enthusiasm has stayed with me over the years - together with a deep admiration not only for Galen, the photographer, but also Galen, the human being.

And should I ever have the kind of money where I can spend 900 bucks on a print, I'd chose Galen's art over Bruce's any day ...