Philip Hyde At Home In The Wilds 2

July 28th, 2010 by David Leland Hyde 4 comments »

The Now Defunct Darkroom Photography Magazine: Masters of the Darkroom Series Presents Part Two Of An Interview With Philip Hyde By Merry Selk Blodgett

At Home In The Wilds

CONTINUED FROM THE BLOG POST, “Philip Hyde At Home In The Wilds 1.” For more on early color printing and the dye transfer process, see also the blog posts, “The Legend Of Dye Transfer Printing 1,” and “The Legend of Dye Transfer Printing 2.”)

“Even after five years, I haven’t been able to get into all the refinements of the dye transfer process.”

Mt. Brooks, Brooks Range, Denali National Park, Alaska, 1971 by Philip Hyde. This photograph Philip Hyde made with the same tripod setup as his horizontal of "Mt. Denali, Wonder Lake." After he triggered the shutter on the Mt. Denali image, he swiveled the camera about one frame's width to the left and made this photograph. Edward Weston used to do this too. Actually, the two Philip Hyde Alaska photographs overlap. David Leland Hyde at age six was present for both on this rare sunny day in Denali National Park. This digital image and the prints made from it so far were from a flatbed Creo scan of a dye transfer print. You would think that scanning the print directly would cause the scan to match the dye transfer print. However, this image took more photoshop work to match the color balance, contrast and other qualities, particularly the sharpness of the original print than did "Mt. Denali, Wonder Lake, Alaska," which we drum scanned from a transparency. Recently we made a drum scan of the original transparency of the photograph above, "Mt. Brooks, Brooks Range, Alaska." The resulting file will help assure that future large archival fine art digital prints of this photograph will maintain Philip Hyde's high standards of sharpness, detail and color fidelity.

(To see the photograph full size, Click Here.)

(To see “Mt. Denali, Wonder Lake (Horizontal)” full size Click Here.)

(To see “Mt. Denali, Reflection Pond (Vertical)” full size Click Here.)

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: How does your dye transfer printing relate to your primary objective of portraying nature?

PHILIP HYDE: I have always wanted to interpret and express the beauty of what I see in nature. My major objective is producing a print that, as Ansel Adams says, carries out the score of the negative. So I orchestrate the dye transfer process to produce a print that conveys the colors and beauty of the original transparencies. Sometimes getting everything just right can be very time-consuming.

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: Are you ever tempted to go back out into the field and let a custom lab do the darkroom work for you?

PHILIP HYDE: No…it would be very hard for me to sell a print made by a lab as my own work. That’s really why I’m doing dye transfer printing, because I can carry the process all the way from start to finish. I make the print the way I want. Also, there’s a cost factor. A single dye transfer print from a custom lab costs $200 and up.

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: You mentioned before that the longevity of the dye transfer process appealed to you. How long do you expect your prints to last?

PHILIP HYDE: Well, that’s hard to say; hundreds of years I’d hope. The nice thing about dye transfer is that not only is the final color image quite stable, but the intermediate films, the separations, which contain all the color information, are actually black and white. So a basic record of the color image exists on black and white film, which, if archivally processed and stored, can last for thousands of years. That’s more than permanent enough for me. Another reason I’m into making dye transfers of my transparencies is that I have to send out my originals for reproduction in books and magazines, and they are often returned after reproduction with thumbprints or dirt all over them. If I’ve made dye transfer separations beforehand, I’m protected.

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: How did you first get interested in photography?

PHILIP HYDE: When I was 16, I went backpacking in the Sierra with the Scouts. I took a folding Kodak with me, and I got hooked on it. I guess it’s just like falling in love with anything. When I sent the films to the druggist, I thought the results were completely inadequate, so at age 17, I set up a darkroom and started working. Though I now work in color, most of my early work was black and white.

“Imogen Cunningham is a wonderful example—she just kept on being a photographer until she faded away.”

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: Over the years, you’ve collaborated with the Sierra Club to produce books that have been instrumental in saving wildernesses, books like Slickrock, about the southwestern Canyonlands, and Alaska: The Great Land. How did you first become involved with the Sierra Club?

PHILIP HYDE:  When I returned to San Francisco from the service in 1946, I enrolled in Ansel Adams’ new photography program at the California School of Fine Arts now the San Francisco Art Institute. I became interested in what the Sierra Club was doing at that time, so Ansel introduced me to Dave Brower (then Sierra Club Executive Director), and that was the beginning of a life-long relationship.

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: Do you ever think of retiring from photography?

PHILIP HYDE: I can’t think of what I’d retire from, or for, or to. It disturbs me to slow down when there’s so much more to be done. Imogen Cunningham is a wonderful example—she just kept on being a photographer until she faded away. That’s a great way to go.

Photography’s Golden Era 6

July 22nd, 2010 by David Leland Hyde 6 comments »

The Early Days Of Ansel Adam’s Photography Department At The California School Of Fine Arts

(Continued from the blog post, “Photography’s Golden Era 5.”)

The Minarets From Tarn Above Lake Ediza, Minarets Wilderness (now the Ansel Adams Wilderness), Sierra Nevada Mountain Range, California, 1950 by Philip Hyde. This photograph Ansel Adams said he liked better than his own of the Minarets. Philip Hyde during and after photography school at the California School of Fine Art was invited by his teachers and mentors, Ansel Adams, Minor White, Edward Weston, Imogen Cunningham and Dorothea Lange to exhibit his photographs with theirs in major exhibitions. He exibited on several occasions with Edward Weston in a two-man show, once with Minor White in a two-man show, and in group shows with members of Group f.64. This photograph of the Minarets was chosen for a number of the exhibitions and now resides in national collections such as the Eastman Kodak House and others.

The Dispersion of Group f.64 Members

From Group f.64’s beginnings in the San Francisco Bay Area, members dispersed in various directions, setting out to show the world that this “new” form of photography would not only take, it would become the prevailing form. Today in the Twenty-first century people all over the world study the work of the members of Group f.64 and similar greats of the Modern Era, which lasted roughly from 1930 through the 1950s in the United States.

Many members of Group f.64 left the Bay Area in pursuit of a change in public perception of what made a photograph art. Willard Van Dyke moved to New York and became an avant garde filmmaker believing “film could promote change faster than still photography.” Ansel Adams also spent time in New York and mounted exhibitions of his work there. Edward Weston went to Santa Barbara to be with his son. Many accounts agree that Group f.64 was mainly social and short-lived. “Yet in interviews with these now famous photographers,” Therese Thau Heyman in Seeing Straight: The F.64 Revolution in Photography pointed out,  “In their notes and letters, and in newspaper reviews beginning with the (De Young Museum) exhibition, there are indications that these assumptions are hasty. Hurried notes, a few initials in exhibition lists, and recently discovered letters refer not to one but to a series of shows. Los Angeles, Portland, Carmel, Seattle, and still other sites are mentioned as venues at which the photographs were seen…”

Photography Obtains Status With Other Arts: A Photography Department At The Museum Of Modern Art

In 1940 David McAlpin, a Rockefeller heir and trustee of the Museum of Modern Art in New York, abbreviated MoMA, financed the founding of a department of photography at the museum. A Harvard-trained art historian, MoMA librarian and curator of MoMA’s first photographic exhibition in 1937, Beaumont Newhall was the department’s curator. McAlpin’s gift was contingent on Ansel Adams consenting to be vice-chairman and agreeing to come to New York for six months to advise the launch. Over 500 New Yorkers turned out for the first opening. This was regarded as a large crowd for such an event and Time Magazine asserted that such a department gave photography equal status to painting and sculpture. However, most other press failed to recognize its significance.

Ansel Adams Invents The Zone System

With the idea of furthering photography as an art form Ansel Adams began to teach workshops and classes. He developed his ‘Zone System’ while teaching at the Art Center School in Los Angeles in 1941. The ‘Zone System’ enabled even inexperienced photographers to make quality photographs. Simplified, the ‘Zone System’ is a method for measuring light and dark tones in the photograph’s subject and corresponding values in the final print. Assigning Roman numerals from one at near-white to ten at near-black becomes what Ansel Adams called, “A framework for understanding exposure and development, and visualizing their effect in advance.”

The Controversy Over Photography At The California School Of Fine Arts

The California School of Fine Arts, where my father Philip Hyde studied under Group f.64 members Edward Weston, Ansel Adams, Dorothea Lange and Imogen Cunningham, by 1945 had a prestigious reputation as an art school with painting faculty including Elmer Bischoff, Mark Rothko and Clyfford Still. Ted Spencer, president of the San Francisco Art Association that owned the controlling interest in the California School of Fine Arts, asked Ansel Adams to set up a Department of Photography. Spencer set aside the greater part of the main basement and one of the large studios for the new department. With Advice from Ted Spencer, Ansel Adams designed three darkrooms and a large demonstration area. The lowest estimate for the construction came in at $9,500. Following a search elsewhere, Adams finally received $10,000 from the Columbia Foundation and raised another $2,500 for equipment. After many delays and complications, California School of Fine Art students from other art departments surprised Ansel Adams. “The painters, sculptors, printmakers, and ceramicists arose in wrath and protest; photography is not an art, they claimed, and had no place in an art school,” Ansel Adams said. Additionally they asserted that space was already too limited in school facilities and classrooms. Ted Spencer insisted photography deserved a program and prevailed though objection bubbled just beneath the surface, particularly in the painting department, where both student and faculty continued to conspire against the new department. Ansel Adams said he was “unpopular,” until he proved that his “basic teaching in that medium, in both craft and aesthetic direction, was agreeable and progressive.”

Philip Hyde Writes Ansel Adams For Advice

In 1945, Sargeant Philip Hyde, while awaiting “separation” from the Army Air Corp was stationed at Maxwell Field, Montgomery, Alabama. Having heard of Ansel Adams before World War II, he wrote to the master landscape photographer in San Francisco and asked for advice on choosing good photography schools. Ansel Adams replied to Philip Hyde with a four-page letter discussing the pros and cons of various types of training. Near the end he mentioned that he just then happened to be working to obtain funding for the first college-level photography department ever at the California School of Fine Arts. Besides his extensive good advice to the young Sargeant, Ansel Adams wrote Philip Hyde, “This is confidential but…. We are hoping to establish the most advanced and effective photographic school in the country…. Do not be taken with the idea that technique is the only requirement, or that photography can be mastered in a year. It is just as tough as music, architecture, or painting–if it is going to be good.”

Philip Hyde was honorably discharged in December 1945 and made it home to San Francisco by Christmas. Philip Hyde briefly met his future wife, my mother Ardis King at a New Year’s Eve Party in San Francisco. They did not each other again until that Fall 1946, when Philip Hyde took some classes at the University of California Berkeley through a twist of fate. Ansel Adams taught a one-month course in January 1946 and a Summer Session from June 24 through August 2. The first regular semester day class was to start in September 1946.

Philip Hyde Looses His Place In Class But Gains His Life Long Companion

Philip Hyde attended the Summer Session with Ansel Adams waiting eagerly for the Fall class. However, a surprise awaited him. “Nearly 500 students applied to the photography program,” wrote Jeff Gunderson in The Moment of Seeing: Minor White at the California School of Fine Arts. “The capacity of the laboratory facilities limited the number of students to 36.” Philip Hyde had written and applied early but due to some mix-up in his paperwork or confusion over the date of his application, Ansel Adams had to write to let him know that he “headed the waiting list” for the next regular semester day class to start the following Fall 1947. He would have to wait a year. He was upset at the time but Minor White suggested it was an opportunity to get some broader education using his G.I. Bill.

Philip Hyde applied to U. C. Berkeley and took a design class, a painting class with the famous Japanese painter Chiura Obata and several other classes over two semesters. He also ran across Ardis King again, who was studying for her teaching credential. They eventually were married in June 1947 (More in a future blog post and in the book.) “If it weren’t for the mix-up at CSFA,” Dad said. “I never would have become acquainted with my future wife. Thus the year he waited to go to photography school became one of the happiest years of his life. However, when he joined the second regular class in September 1947, something else had changed.

Ansel Adams Leaves Minor White In Charge Of The New Photography Department

In 1946 Ansel Adams received his first Guggenheim Fellowships to photograph national parks. During the Summer Session he trained photographer Minor White, imported from Princeton, to take his place as lead instructor. This freed Ansel Adams to hit the road. Ansel Adams taught the first three weeks of the course in the Fall of 1947 and then left for Death Valley and on to the Southwest to photograph. Minor White was left with a somewhat disgruntled crew of students who had expected to learn directly from Ansel Adams. However, the students soon realized that Minor White was a superb teacher and took their studies far beyond mere technique. Philip Hyde did not become disappointed because he had seen Minor White and Ansel Adams work together in the 1946 Summer Session.

Minor White wrote of Ansel Adams in Memorable Fancies, “This morning in his class at the California School of Fine Arts the whole muddled business of exposure and development fell into place. This afternoon I started teaching his Zone System.” Ansel Adams wrote of Minor White in his Biography, “After seeing his photographs and observing his teaching of the students over the space of a few weeks, I quickly recognized that Minor White was a remarkable photographer and a potentially great teacher.”

Despite mutual respect the two men often had opposite views. Ansel Adams said that the craft of photography could be taught but that the art of seeing was not expressible or teachable. Nor did he believe photographs should be psychologically analyzed. In contrast, Minor White had learned Freudian analysis from the eminent art historian Meyer Schapiro at Columbia University. Minor White taught what he called Space Analysis. Benjamen Chinn, Philip Hyde, Bill Heick, David Johnson and what ended up being about 11 other photography students started the second full-time day student class in Fall 1947. Benjamen Chinn said that the students teased Minor White, accusing him of picking subjects out of the morning newspaper and analitically relating them to photographs. Though their approaches differed, Ansel Adams and Minor White developed a mutual respect and became good friends as can be readily seen in their letters to each other. Both instructors and students benefited from the lively interaction of the conflicting perspectives of the two master photographers.

Related Posts On Ansel Adams, Minor White and Edward Weston

Ansel Adams Photo Plates From Garage Sale Worth $200 Million

Summertime: Yosemite National Park

About Archival Fine Art Digital Prints

July 19th, 2010 by David Leland Hyde 5 comments »

Archival Fine Art Digital Prints | Fine Art Photography | Print Making

For more information about NEW RELEASES see the blog post, “New Releases Now At Special Introductory Pricing.”

Printing Materials And Processes

Philip Hyde archival fine art digital prints in color were printed in 2008, 2009 and the beginning of 2010 with a 13-ink Epson 9800 Inkjet printer on Premium Luster paper. The archival fine art digital prints in black and white were printed in the first half of 2009 on a 16-ink Epson 11880 Inkjet printer on Premium Luster paper and in the second half of 2009 and beyond on Crane Silver Rag paper. The color archival digital prints beginning in 2010 are now printed with a Lightjet 5000 printer on Fuji Crystal Archive paper, in which case they are not pigment prints but prints digitally exposed with light. On occasion the color prints are also printed with the Epson 9800 on a new archival 100 percent cotton rag paper. The life of any of these prints is much longer than those of print making methods of the past. In addition, the process of translating a 4X5 or 5X7 film original transparency or negative into digital print-ready form is complicated, expensive, time consuming and expert labor intensive. The highest quality equipment and methods known are used at each step starting with drum scanning and ending with print preparation.

Fine Art Photographer And Print Maker Carr Clifton

Landscape photographer and print maker Carr Clifton has made archival fine art digital prints for Philip Hyde since 2001, five years before Philip Hyde passed on. When Carr Clifton expressed interest in photography over 35 years ago, his mother took him to meet Philip Hyde who happened to be a neighbor. From then on Philip Hyde was a mentor and friend to Carr Clifton. Carr Clifton has become a highly respected outdoor photographer in his own right. The two landscape photographers worked on several book projects together. Also, side-by-side for many years their photographs dominated the Sierra Club Calendars that contained the work of the most famous nature photographers of the time.

Philip Hyde authorized and signed five of the new archival fine art digital prints before he passed on. The new prints are produced by Philip Hyde’s son, David Leland Hyde and Carr Clifton. This equates with Brett Weston or Cole Weston printing Edward Weston’s photographs, as other famous photographers heirs have done. Alan Ross has made special edition Ansel Adams prints for many years. A great amount of time, effort and expense has gone into matching as close as possible the way that Philip Hyde printed the photographs. Having been around Philip Hyde for many years, both David Leland Hyde and Carr Clifton work to maintain Philip Hyde’s straight photography aesthetics of limiting color saturation and maintaining tasteful photo realism when no Philip Hyde model print is available.

Rare Philip Hyde Original Prints Often Long Sold Out

Philip Hyde original prints are very rare and most of the best images have long sold out. Also, because Philip Hyde lost his eyesight, many of his best later work was never printed. When Philip Hyde was print making himself, he produced traditional black and white silver gelatin prints, color dye-transfer prints and color Cibachrome prints. He did not print the same best images over and over like many photographers. Each time he came home from a photography trip, he printed only 2 or 4 color prints from that excursion. If there was an order for more he might print as many as 2 to 4 more prints given the time, difficulty and cost of color print making. In the earlier days before his transition to color in the early to mid 1970s, the black and white prints were made in edtions of 4 or 6. On rare occasions with only a few of the images, he printed as many as 10 or 12 prints. After printing from one project, he would go on a new trip, return and print the new images from the new outing. He rarely went back and printed older images. As a result, most prints of the well-known images are now gone.

New Archival Fine Art Digital Prints Allow Collectors To Enjoy New Releases And Old Favorites Again

The new archival fine art digital prints allow collectors and fans of conservation photography to enjoy new releases and the old favorites that in many cases have not been printed or exhibited for decades. The archival fine art digital prints are limited in production by the expense and difficulty of translation from large format film to quality digital images. Each of the archival fine art digital prints are produced in special editions that are numbered. The prints of any given image go up in price $100 in all print sizes each time 10 prints of any size sell. For example, “Virginia Creeper” has sold nearly 10 prints and will go up in price $100 soon. Those photographs that sell higher quantities will eventually become much higher valued than the others. For example, when 200 prints of an image have sold, it will be valued at $2,000 more in all print sizes than it was to begin with and $2,000 more than prints of the other photographs. This will not only increase perceived and actual value of the prints over time, but will limit production and sales of each print and make them more attrative to collectors.

The Mission, In Part

A portion of proceeds from fine art digital print sales will fund green energy development, land conservation and other environmental causes. Philip Hyde’s prints are in permanent collections in institutions such as The Smithsonian, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, George Eastman House, Time Life Gallery, California Academy of Sciences, The International Center of Photography and The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

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See Philip Hyde Photography for Philip Hyde Archival Fine Art Digital Prints Pricing

For print acquisitions, questions or to just say hi, please contact:
David Leland Hyde
prints@philiphyde.com
Orders can also be placed on the Philip Hyde Photography Website through the Portfolios that contain a Shopping Cart.

Salmon In The Trees: Amy Gulick’s Conservation Photography

July 15th, 2010 by David Leland Hyde 2 comments »

A Profile Of Amy Gulick’s Work In Conservation Photography And An Announcement Of Her New Book… Salmon In The Trees: Life In Alaska’s Tongass Rain Forest

Amy Gulick Won the NANPA Philip Hyde Grant in 2008 for her work in the Tongass National Forest beginning in 2007.

(See also the blog post, “NANPA Philip Hyde Grant 2010” about Paul Colangelo’s conservation photography in Northern British Columbia)

Tongass National Forest, Alaska, by Amy Gulick, from the project Salmon in the Trees: Life in Alaska's Tongass Rain Forest

The Philip Hyde Grant’s 2008 recipient, Lowell Thomas Award winner and founding fellow of the International League of Conservation Photographers, Amy Gulick, recently launched her new book Salmon In The Trees: Life In Alaska’s Tongass Rain Forest.

Amy Gulick’s photographs in Salmon in the Trees, document the cycle of life in the Tongass National Forest in Southeast Alaska. The Tongass National Forest contains one-third of the world’s remaining rare temperate rain forests and the largest reserves of old growth forests in the United States. The Tongass rain forest, like other old growth forests, is an intricately balanced ecosystem and a chain of interactions with links that are weakening due to increasing outside pressures.

Continuing In The Tradition Of Conservation Photography Pioneered By Philip Hyde

Salmon In the Trees: Life In Alaska’s Tongass Rain Forest deepens and expands the work of Philip Hyde, whose photographs helped expand portions of the Tongass National Forest and protected it from destruction nearly 40 years ago. The threats today are greater as the delicate balance of the ecosystems within the Tongass rain forest are at risk. Yet Salmon In the Trees: Life In Alaska’s Tongass Rain Forest, “portrays a hopeful story,” said the website text of the publisher, Braided River. The text continues:

…The Tongass is one of the rarest ecosystems on Earth. Humpback whales, orcas, and sea lions cruise the forested shorelines. Millions of wild salmon swim upstream into the forest, feeding an abundance of bears and bald eagles. Native cultures and local communities benefit from the gifts of both the forest and sea. But the global demands of our modern world may threaten this great forest’s biological riches. With camera and rain gear in hand, photographer Amy Gulick paddled and trekked among the bears, misty islands, and salmon streams… she met bush pilots, fishermen, guides, and artists…

Black Bear Paws and Salmon, Tongass National Forest, Alaska, by Amy Gulick, from the project Salmon in the Trees: Life in Alaska's Tongass Rain Forest

Amy Gulick also wrote about her Tongass conservation photography project in Outdoor Photographer in an article with the same title as her book, Salmon In The Trees. The following is from a caption to one of her photographs of the Tongass National Forest in Outdoor Photographer:

At 16.8 million acres, the Tongass is the largest national forest in the U. S.; about 40% of the Tongass consists of glacial ice fields, alpine tundra, wetlands and water, [the rest is temperate rain forest]. Bears play a significant role in spreading nutrient-packed salmon carcasses throughout the forest—the bodies of the salmon decay into the soil, and trees absorb the nutrients through their roots.

Amy Gulick’s Outdoor Photographer article continues:

Salmon live on in frolicking spring cubs, plump blueberries, new growth rings in tree trunks and downy eaglets perched in their nests. And the next generation of salmon is swaddled in the streams and incubated by the forest. The fertilized eggs will soon hatch, ensuring that the cycle of life is a circle, always flowing, never broken…. But we’re on our way to carving up this extraordinary forest. We only have to look south to the once-magnificent salmon rain forests of Washington, Oregon and northern California to see how quickly we can decimate ancient trees, wild salmon and a rich way of life…. Continued threats include logging, mining, industrial-scale tourism, energy development and global climate change.

Salmon In The Trees: The Culmination Of A Three-Year Conservation Photography Project

When I heard about Salmon In The Trees, I asked Amy Gulick if her new book was a culmination of the conservation photography project she was working on in 2008 when she won the prestigious North American Nature Photography Association’s 2008 Philip Hyde Grant. She explained that part of the criteria for the NANPA Philip Hyde Grant is that the conservation photography project already be in progress. She explained:

When I won the 2008 Philip Hyde Grant, I was halfway through completing the photography for my Tongass project. I started the project in the spring of 2007, applied for the grant in August 2007, and was awarded the grant in winter 2008. I then spent the spring and summer of 2008 completing the photography. It took most of 2009 to design and produce the book, web site, YouTube videos, and exhibit in Juneau, Alaska.

Caribou Crossing, Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Alaska, by Amy Gulick, from the project Arctic National Wildlife Refuge: Wilderness or Wasteland?

Besides her conservation photography work in the Tongass rain forest, Amy Gulick’s Internet story “Arctic National Wildlife Refuge: Wilderness or Wasteland?” won a Lowell Thomas Travel Journalism Award presented by the Society of American Travel Writers Foundation. Also, the Alaska Conservation Foundation named Amy Gulick the 2008 recipient of the Daniel Housberg Wilderness Image Award for Excellence in Still Photography. The award recognizes photography projects that advance the protection of Alaska’s wilderness environment, further discussion of issues relating to habitat and stewardship of the state’s natural resources, and enhance greater public education relating to these areas. For more news about Amy Gulick and her conservation photography Click Here and to view the book trailer go to YouTube.

Denali National Park, Alaska Travel Log 4

July 12th, 2010 by David Leland Hyde 5 comments »

Denali National Park, Alaska Travel Log: June 14-September 14, 1971 by Ardis Hyde

(Ardis, David and Philip Hyde in Their Camper. Continued from the blog post, “Denali National Park, Alaska Travel Log 3.”)

Part Four: Ketchikan to Wrangell, Alaska

Forest of Snags, Chichagof Island, Alaska, 1971 by Philip Hyde.

June 24, 1971: I woke up at 7 am and announced sunshine, our first since Victoria six days ago. Philip broke out his 4X5 for the first time on the trip and headed out towards Ward Lake on the nature trail. He was happy to get the ground dogwood on 4X5. From there we retraced our route, stopping at the Lilly Pad lakes for a photograph with the mountain background reflected. Back to town for food shopping while David and Philip scrambled along the rocks of the rip-rap.  Drove up the hill to a small community college where the Bald Eagles were abundant. Went to the Ferry landing to check in at 12 noon.

(Note: The photographs mentioned have not yet been drum scanned for fine are digital printing or to appear here or on the Philip Hyde website.)

We had a long wait before boarding. Finally we drove onto the Ferry but it didn’t get underway until about 3:15 pm. Skies were still clear with clouds in streaks across the heavens but not in the way of the brilliant sun. The ferry this time was called the Matanuska, smaller than the Wickersham and easy to find our way around in with a central stairwell next to which the camper was parked. The ferry was late starting and late to arrive in Wrangell, Alaska. David found a boy his age to play paper airplane with. While I took a pay shower, Philip made 2 ¼ pictures of the route. Totem Bight Park was visible in the distance.

The scenery became more interesting as we entered Stikine Strait. As we approached Chichagof Pass, part of Wrangell was visible with the highest mountains yet, visible on the skyline. Some were smooth white domes of snow. One in particular was a jagged rock crest, probably Castle Mountain. We rounded Wronski Island and the mountains almost ringed the horizon in nearly every direction, with their splendid white summits. It was beginning to really look like Alaska. Philip took a 120 photograph of Boundary Peaks.

After docking around 8:45 pm, we backed off of the Ferry among the first. The light was low and mellow and it was warm and beautiful as we drove off. Philip made the first photograph at Shakes Island. His composition contained another Indian Ceremonial House surrounded by flowering trees and Totem poles. At low tide then, mud flats surrounded the island. Bright fishing boats crowded the harbor docks. The town seems tiny with many older frame houses retaining some degree of charm. Heavy moss grew on some shingle roofs. Totem poles erected here and there around town. New looking Stikine Lodge on filled ground at the water’s edge. Two lumber mills operating in town and another south of town. Proceeded out south to Pat Creek Campground. Houses occasionally all the way, forests cleared on the water side, logging stumps on the other. Not much hint of wilderness left.

June 25, 1971: We woke up late at 7:45 am. Rain again after only one day of sunshine. The gloomy skies lifted by 1:30 pm, though. We spent the morning leisurely doing chores, Philip packing film to mail, David building a Lego chainsaw and logging. Then he changed to being captain of the Wickersham with his raincoat and billed hat on, passing out “waterproof tickets” that were pieces of his raincoat material found in his pocket. We had popcorn and hot chocolate for lunch. After pulling out of this logged-over Forest Service Campground, we stopped at the roadside to look at tiny flowers. Philip made close-ups with his 35 mm camera of a heather-like plant, lichen, fern fronds, and other ground cover. We made more stops on the route back to town. David was asleep and the rain stopped. Then we stopped at the water’s edge where the forest curtain is still intact. We walked out on the beach to discover it was very different from Ketchikan. Here large boulders of fine grain granite are imbedded in a ground of small rounded rocks that are white, grey and dark slate. At this spot Philip took pictures of the beach rocks and their backdrop of forest, which is an abrupt wall that begins at the high tide mark. At the next picture stop, Philip caught some light, wispy waterfalls at the road edge.

A brief stop for groceries in town after we looked in vain for petroglyphs a mile south of the city park as stated in Milepost. No trouble finding the petroglyphs at the north end of town location at the end of the boardwalk. We had help from a neighborhood boy, Lance Koenig, who came up to the car and asked, “May I be of service?” He took us right to the petroglyph rocks. Then he and David had a marvelous time throwing rocks at tin cans they set up on boulders, knocking them into the incoming tide. This tide had covered we didn’t know how many of the petroglyphs, but Philip took photographs of those still out. An old rusty carpenter’s plane was resting on a drift log. David brought it back to the camper and set about at dinner to plane everything around. He was also absorbed in being the captain of a cruise ship, Philip and I being his crew. He got himself all decked out in navy blue jeans, raincoat and Davy’s old ski hat. (Davy refers to David Lee Hyde who was Philip Hyde’s brother and David Leland Hyde’s namesake. He was killed in the Korean War.) After petroglyphs, we drove out airport road as far as we could for more photographs of the dwarf forest with ponds in the foreground and peaks behind. At the Ferry dock we found out we couldn’t board the next Ferry because it was the Wickersham, which was too large to load vehicles at Wrangell. We walked around the docks, put David down, then walked some more. We heard the high school band coming from somewhere. Turned out they were escorting and welcoming the cruise ship Arcadia that was circling the outer harbor because it was too big to land. A very festive and lively scene with assorted small craft maneuvering across the horizon as well. Tried to wake up David but not possible. Philip made more photographs around the breakwater and as we went through a dripping jungle of thimble berries.

June 26, 1971: Glad to see some breaks in the sky and faint sunlight early in the day. Bought a half pound of fresh pink shrimp from the cannery right from the man loading them into cans to be frozen…

CONTINUED IN THE BLOG POST, “Denali National Park, Alaska Travel Log 5.”

Scott Nichols Gallery Summer Show

July 6th, 2010 by David Leland Hyde 4 comments »

The Scott Nichols Gallery Presents

THE SUMMER SHOW

Jeanne And The Longboard, circa 1963, by Ron Church.

The Scott Nichols Gallery is proud to present The Summer Show, a selection of photographs from the gallery’s collection. The exhibition features over 100 vintage and contemporary fine art prints by Berenice Abbott, Ansel Adams, Ruth Bernhard, Wynn Bullock, Harry Callahan, Paul Caponigro, Ron Church, Imogen Cunningham, Monica Denevan, William Garnett, Lucy Goodhart, Rolfe Horn, Philip Hyde, Mona Kuhn, Dorothea Lange, Barbara Morgan, Rondal Partridge, Michael Rauner, George Tice, Brett Weston, Edward Weston, Don Worth and others.

CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE EXHIBITION

July 1 – September 4, 2010

Let Liberty And Freedom Ring…

July 4th, 2010 by David Leland Hyde 8 comments »

Happy 4th Of July!  Independence Day…

United States Of America 13-Star Betsy Ross Flag, courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.

This is the original rebel flag…

Did you know that Thomas Jefferson and John Adams both died on the 4th of July, 1826? There was something deeper and more profound going on with these two men and the other founders of this country than is easily seen. Have you ever looked carefully at a dollar bill? The structures that made our nation were fashioned as precisely as the pyramids and in a state of perfection as precise as the temples of any ancient people, both physically and metaphysically. They conceived a system that would last and keep the people in power. They designed the three branches of government to limit each other. They built the system to support business, but also warned us to be wary of business interests corrupting the system.

Here are some of the insights and admonitions of our founding fathers:

Power is not alluring to pure minds. –Thomas Jefferson

What country can preserve its liberties if its rulers are not warned from time to time that their people preserve the spirit of resistance?  –Thomas Jefferson

A free people claim their rights as derived from the laws of nature, and not as the gift of their chief magistrate. –Thomas Jefferson

Banks have done more injury to the religion, morality, tranquility, prosperity, and even wealth of the nation than they can have done or ever will do good.  –John Adams

Government is instituted for the common good; for the protection, safety, prosperity, and happiness of the people; and not for profit, honor, or private interest of any one man, family, or class of men; therefore, the people alone have an incontestable, unalienable, and indefeasible right to institute government; and to reform, alter, or totally change the same, when their protection, safety, prosperity, and happiness require it.  –John Adams

Guard against the impostures of pretended patriotism.  –George Washington

If the freedom of speech is taken away then dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep to the slaughter.  –George Washington

When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic.  –Ben Franklin

Freedom is not a gift bestowed upon us by other men, but a right that belongs to us by the laws of God and nature.  –Ben Franklin

Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom. As nations become more corrupt and vicious, they have more need of masters.  –Ben Franklin

They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither safety nor liberty.  –Ben Franklin

New Releases Now At Special Introductory Pricing

June 28th, 2010 by David Leland Hyde 5 comments »

Big News!

For A Limited Time Four NEW RELEASES of Archival Fine Art Digital Prints Will Be at Special Introductory Prices:

1.  “Men of Oaxaca, Oaxaca, Mexico”
Never before published or exhibited. World Premier at Mountain Light Gallery. (See the photograph full page, CLICK HERE.)

Base Of Havasu Falls, Havasupai Indian Reservation, Grand Canyon, Arizona, 1968 by Philip Hyde.

Also, for more information about the process of bringing these images into the digital age, scanning, processing and making archival fine art digital prints see the blog post, “About Archival Fine Art Digital Prints,” and the blog post, “New Philip Hyde Releases At Mountain Light Gallery Exhibition.” For more information on the exhibition see the blog post, “Photography Of Philip Hyde At Mountain Light Gallery.”


2.  “Pioneer Basin, Fourth Recess, John Muir Wilderness, Sierra Nevada, California”
Never before published or exhibited. World Premier at Mountain Light Gallery.
(See the photograph full page, CLICK HERE.)


3.  “Base of Havasu Falls, Havasupai Indian Reservation, Grand Canyon, Arizona”
Widely published and exhibited but not for over 30 years. Contemporary Premier at Mountain Light Gallery. Added to website today.
(See the photograph full page, CLICK HERE.)


4.  “Mt. Jefferson, Jefferson Wilderness Area, Oregon Cascades, Oregon”
Published over 50 years ago but never exhibited. World Premier at Mountain Light Gallery. Added to website today.
(See the photograph full page, CLICK HERE.)

Mt. Jefferson, Jefferson Wilderness Area, Oregon Cascade Mountains, Oregon, 1959 by Philip Hyde. Sent by David Brower to photograph this wilderness area for potential campaign to establish a National Park. The idea of a National Park in the Oregon Cascades never gained significant support.

The special pricing will last until five (5) prints of any size sell of each image, or until the end of 2010, whichever comes first.

8X10    regular price $250 print only, unmatted and unframed, special price $175 for the first five prints or through December 31, 2010

11X14   normally $450, now $350 first five

16X20   normally $650, now $500 first five

20X24   normally $850, now $625

24X30   normally $1050, now $750

32X40   normally $1250, now $875

Regular Pricing

Philip Hyde Archival Fine Art Digital Prints Regular Pricing

Print Size      Unmatted/Unframed           Matted         Matted & Framed

8X10               $250                                     $275                        $300

11X14                450                                       500                           550

16X20               650                                       725                           800

20X24              850                                       950                         1050

24X30*           1050                                     1175                         1300

32X40*           1250                                    1400                         1550

*Some photographs not available in 24X30 or 32X40 sizes.

Each print is numbered as part of a special edition. Every time an image sells 10 prints, it goes up $100 in all sizes. For example: We have made 14 prints of “K-RR-52 Virginia Creeper” and sold seven. As soon as three more prints sell in any size, the prints will go up $100 in all sizes. Thus “Virginia Creeper” will be $350 for an unmatted and unframed 8X10 print, $550 for an 11X14, $750 for a 16X20 and so on.

Philip Hyde New Releases Archival Print Pricing

As of June 28, 2010

(This pricing applies only to the new releases.)

Print Size      Unmatted/Unframed           Matted         Matted & Framed

8X10               $175                                        $200                        $225

11X14                350                                          400                          450

16X20              500                                           575                          650

20X24              625                                           725                          825

24X30*            750                                          875                         1000

32X40*            875                                        1025                          1175

*Some photographs not available in 24X30 or 32X40 sizes.

This special pricing will last until five (5) prints are sold of the image offered, or until the end of 2010, whichever comes first. Once five prints sell or 2010 ends, the prints will revert to the regular pricing.

For Print Acquisitions Please Go To Contact Page Or Order Prints Inside New Releases Portfolio.

Ralph Waldo Emerson On Henry David Thoreau

June 22nd, 2010 by David Leland Hyde 11 comments »

Part Of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s 1862 Eulogy And Tribute To Henry David Thoreau

From Selections from Ralph Waldo Emerson Edited by Stephen E. Whicher

“I make my pride in making my dinner cost little.”

Ardis and Philip Hyde in Front of the McCaulay Homestead Cabin in Tuolumne Meadows, Yosemite National Park, California, Summer 1949 by John Rogers, CSFA Classmate of Philip Hyde's. Ansel Adams helped Ardis and Philip Hyde land this job as summer caretakers of the Sierra Club Parson's Lodge. It was their first cabin in the wilderness but not their last. There were several more until finally eight years later, Ardis and Philip Hyde built their own home in wilderness more remote than Tuolumne Meadows. This became their lifetime "Walden." Besides John Muir, Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau were Philip Hyde's best loved literary heroes.

Henry David Thoreau, though he was graduated at Harvard College in 1837, declined to give up his large ambition of knowledge and action for any narrow craft or profession, aiming at a much more comprehensive calling, the art of living well.

Never idle or self-indulgent, he preferred, when he wanted money, earning it by some piece of manual labor agreeable to him, as building a boat or a fence, planting, grafting, surveying or other short work, to any long engagements.  With his hardy habits and few wants, his skill in wood-craft, and his powerful arithmetic, he was very competent to live in any part of the world. It would cost him less time to supply his wants than another.

Henry David Thoreau was a born protestant, and few lives contain so many renunciations. He was bred to no profession; he never married; he lived alone; he never went to church; he never voted; he refused to pay tax to the State; he ate no flesh, he drank no wine, he never knew the use of tobacco; and, though a naturalist, he used neither trap nor gun. He chose, wisely no doubt for himself, to be the bachelor of thought and Nature. He had no talent for wealth, and knew how to be poor without the least hint of squalor or inelegance. He declined invitations to dinner-parties, because there each was in every one’s way, and he could not meet the individuals to any purpose. “They make their pride,” he said, “in making their dinner cost much; I make my pride in making my dinner cost little.”

He chose to be rich by making his wants few, and supplying them himself.

He chose to be rich by making his wants few, and supplying them himself. In his travels, he used the railroad only to get over so much country as was unimportant to the present purpose, walking hundreds of miles, avoiding taverns, buying a lodging in farmers’ and fishermen’s houses, as cheaper, and more agreeable to him, and because there he could better find the men and the information he wanted.

Yet, hermit and stoic as he was, he was really fond of sympathy, and threw himself heartily and childlike into the company of young people whom he loved, and whom he delighted to entertain, as he only could, with the varied and endless anecdotes of his experiences by field and river: and he was always ready to lead a huckleberry-party or a search for chestnuts or grapes.

He was a speaker and actor of the truth, born such, and was ever running into dramatic situations from this cause. In any circumstances it interested all bystanders to know what part Henry David Thoreau would take, and what he would say; and he did not disappoint expectation, but used an original judgment on each emergency. In 1845 he built himself a small framed house on the shores of Walden Pond, and lived there two years alone, a life of labor and study. This action was quite native and fit for him. No one who knew him would tax him with affectation. He was more unlike his neighbors in his thought than in his action. As soon as he had exhausted the advantages of that solitude, he abandoned it. In 1847, not approving some uses to which the public expenditure was applied, he refused to pay his town tax, and was put in jail. A friend paid the tax for him, and he was released. The like annoyance was threatened the next year. But as his friend paid the tax, notwithstanding his protest, I believe he ceased to resist. No opposition or ridicule had any weight with him. He coldly and fully stated his opinion without affecting to believe that it was the opinion of the company. It was of no consequence if every one present held the opposite opinion.

No truer American existed than Henry David Thoreau.

No truer American existed than Henry David Thoreau. His preference of his country and condition was genuine, and his aversation from English and European manners and tastes almost reached contempt. He listened impatiently to news or bonmots gleaned from London circles; and though he tried to be civil, these anecdotes fatigued him. The men were all imitating each other, and on a small mold. Why can they not live as far apart as possible, and each be a man by himself? What he sought was the most energetic nature; and he wished to go to Oregon, not to London. “In every part of Great Britain,” he wrote in his diary, “are discovered traces of the Romans, their funeral urns, their camps, their roads, their dwellings. But New England, at least, is not based on any Roman ruins. We have not to lay the foundation of our houses on the ashes of a former civilization.”

But idealist as he was, standing for abolition of slavery, abolition of tariffs, almost abolition of government, it is needless to say he found himself not only unrepresented in actual politics, but almost equally opposed to every class of reformers. If he brought you yesterday a new proposition, he would bring you today another not less revolutionary. A very industrious man, and setting, like all highly organized men, a high value on his time, he seemed the only man of leisure in town, always ready for any excursion that promised well, or for conversation prolonged into late hours.

His robust common sense, armed with stout hands, keen perceptions and strong will, cannot yet account for the superiority which shone in his simple and hidden life. I must add the cardinal fact, that there was an excellent wisdom in him, proper to a rare class of men, which showed him the material world as a means and symbol. This discovery, which sometimes yields to poets a certain casual and interrupted light, serving for the ornament of their writing, was in him an unsleeping insight; and whatever faults or obstructions of temperament might cloud it, he was not disobedient to the heavenly vision.

Henry David Thoreau dedicated his genius with such entire love to the fields, hills and waters of his native town, that he made them known and interesting to all reading Americans, and to people over the sea. The river on whose banks he was born and died he knew from its springs to its confluence with the Merrimack. He had made summer and winter observations on it for many years, and at every hour of the day and night. Every fact which occurs in the bed, on the banks or in the air over it, the fish, and their spawning and nests, their manners, their food; the shad-flies which fill the air on a certain evening once a year, and which are snapped at by the fish so ravenously that many of these die of repletion; the conical heaps of small stones on the river shallows, the huge nests of small fish; the birds which frequent the stream, heron, duck, sheldrake, loon, osprey; the snake, muskrat, otter, woodchuck and fox, on the banks; the turtle, frog, hyla and cricket, which make the banks vocal—were all known to him.

Philip Hyde At Home In The Wilds 1

June 17th, 2010 by David Leland Hyde 9 comments »

Darkroom Photography Magazine: Masters of the Darkroom Series Presents Part One Of An Interview With Philip Hyde By Merry Selk Blodgett

At Home In The Wilds

One of this century’s premier interpreters of the American wilderness, Philip Hyde has carried his 4X5 to places no camera had been before. Famous for Sierra Club books like Island In Time and The Last Redwoods, Philip Hyde is also a dedicated darkroom “do-it-yourselfer” who uses the complex and beautiful dye transfer process to make color prints. (See the blog posts, “The Legend Of Dye Transfer Printing 1,” and “The Legend of Dye Transfer Printing 2.”) Together with his wife and son, Philip Hyde lives far up in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, in a house he built himself…

“When I first chose photography, I knew I was choosing the pleasures of creativity over the consolations of wealth.”

Virginia Creeper, Northern Sierra Nevada Mountains, California, 1977 by Philip Hyde. This photograph made at the home of the artist, became one of his signature images, though it is not in a pure sense a landscape photograph, as it depicts a domesticated vine on the wall of his house. The photograph appeared on more magazine covers than any other Philip Hyde image, starting with the now defunct Darkroom Photography magazine in 1980. Records are incomplete but some other covers included the Audubon Nature Calendar 1986, Scribner's Group Catalog 1986, Photo-Design Magazine 1985, a poster by James Randklev 1986, New York Life Calendar 1987, Fine Print Custom Photo Lab Catalog 1987 and a number of other company catalogs and brochures. Ardis Hyde originally planted the Virginia Creeper. She was locally well-known in Plumas County for her work with the Audubon Society, for organic gardening and because she gave Virginia Creeper starts to many people. Virginia Creeper can be seen growing all over the Feather River country partly due to the gifts of Ardis Hyde.

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: It’s very beautiful up here in the mountains; the view from this window could be a Sierra Club calendar. But you’re also very far from any large towns, not to mention cities. Do you ever feel isolated up here?

PHILIP HYDE: I don’t think it’s isolation, I think it’s insulation. We’re insulated from a lot of urban influences that I’m not all that interested in. Don’t get me wrong…I like people. I’m very involved in the photographic workshops I’ve been doing. But I guess I like people best in small quantities. For me, the urban environment is too much of a man-made kind of thing. What’s most important to me is to be able to look out the window and see the changes of the seasons, or the rain pouring down, or the stars at night.

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: You’ve got a reputation as one of the top nature photographers in the country. Has your photography made you financially successful?

PHILIP HYDE: I’m not really trying to play the money game. Photography has provided a living, not a bad living at all. But when I left the city in 1959 to come up here, I knew that I was leaving behind the opportunity to make lots of money. I think that when I first chose photography, I knew I was choosing the pleasures of creativity over the consolations of wealth.

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: What is your personal definition of success?

PHILIP HYDE: I define success for myself in terms of my lifestyle. Success is freedom and opportunity to do what I want to do. I would say I’m a success in that respect. But some people seem to think that once you’re successful, you can just coast from then on. That’s certainly not true for me; I have to keep working hard, which is a good thing, or I might sit back on the oars and float downstream.

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: Anyone who makes his own dye transfer color prints certainly isn’t resting on his oars. Frankly, I was surprised to discover that someone as closely associated with outdoor color work as yourself would be spending so much time indoors. Dye transfer color printing is notoriously difficult and time-consuming; it’s usually done only in specially-equipped labs. What made you decide to tackle such a formidable process?

PHILIP HYDE: The beauty of a well-made dye transfer print, for one thing. It’s permanence, for another. I don’t know, maybe it’s lunacy. Or maybe it’s self-punishment and that’s part of my philosophy too. I think that you don’t get something for nothing in this world, and that perhaps struggling for it is a good thing. I’m saying that somewhat facetiously, but I’m not joking. I think there are a lot of aspects of photography now that are so automatic and so easy, and I think that explains the fact that there isn’t an awful lot that’s significant, from a long-term standpoint, being produced.

“Success is freedom and opportunity to do what I want to do.”

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: I take it you’re not partial to motorized, auto-everything 35mm SLRs.

PHILIP HYDE: Well, do you know that old saw about the bunch of monkeys? If you set a bunch of monkeys up at typewriters eventually they would end up typing the Encyclopedia Britannica. That’s a lot of nonsense really, but it’s certainly true that if you run enough film through a camera, sooner or later you’re going to make a significant image. I think an awful lot of people are using 35mm that way. On the other hand, there definitely are people whose work is suited to 35mm…people who can exploit the freedom and flexibility of that format.

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: But you’d rather carry around a 4X5 camera and 30 pounds of gear as you hike through the wilderness.

PHILIP HYDE: Yes.

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: Why?

PHILIP HYDE: For one thing, it would be very hard for me to make high-quality large dye transfer prints from 35mm originals. But deeper than that, I like the 4X5 format because it disciplines you to see carefully. By the time you’ve made the exposure, you are aware of little things you wouldn’t notice in a 35mm viewer. And it’s a discipline in not being profligate with materials; when you’re carrying 30 pounds on your back and have a limited supply of film, you look at everything very critically. You’re less apt to bang away and ask questions later.

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: Let’s return to your current work with the dye transfer color printing process. How long have you been doing it, and how did you get started?

PHILIP HYDE: I began dye transfer printing in 1974. I had been mulling it over for a few years before; my photographer friend Dennis Brokaw tipped the scales when he said he would help me begin. I can still remember the first dye transfer print I made. I was so excited, after years of seeing bad color prints made from my transparencies.

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: Doesn’t the process require a lot of skill and care on your part?

PHILIP HYDE: I suppose so, if you define skill as a reasonably precise manipulation of the material, and having your head together enough so that you do all the intermediate steps in the right order. Dye transfer is a rather complex process, especially when your originals are transparencies, as mine are. But there’s one nice compensation for all the complexity; there are a tremendous number of adjustments and controls at each step of the process, so you can alter the color balance, intensity of colors, and contrast along the way. Even after five years, I haven’t been able to get into all the refinements of the process.

DARKROOM PHOTOGRAPHY: How does your dye transfer printing relate to your primary objective of portraying nature?

PHILIP HYDE: I have always wanted to interpret and express the beauty of what I see in nature. My major objective is…

CONTINUED IN THE UPCOMING BLOG POST, “Philip Hyde At Home In The Wilds 2.”