Last weekend we had the pleasure of participating in the Accessible Art Fair at the Conrad hotel in Brussels, Belgium. It was a exciting fun filled weekend and we met and spoke with at least 3000 people in those two and a half days.

This year we brought our Wet Plate Ambrotypes and Albumen hand pulled Prints along to showcase. The public were very receptive to this historic techniques and enjoyed very much looking through our 100+ year old Charten Whole Plate camera.

We demonstrated the Collodion Wet Plate process in a dry manner due to the fact we were inside a very swanky hotel, but I believe the concept came across to everyone.

Here are a few images from the event and we hope to return again with something new again in 2011.

Thank you to everyone who came out in support to see us in Brussels!

What’s next you ask for Boston Thek Imagery? Well, on the weekend of 5-7 November 2010 you can out and meet artists and buy some amazing art! If you are in the Brussels area and even if you are not…it is worth the drive. Come by and say hello!

BAAF Laura Boston Thek

I must thank also my friends and neighbors for coming out in support. A big thank you goes to the Rathaus (town hall) of course, Frau Stahl who organized the night and Mayor Ziegler for his many kind words. Obsthof Schuhmann of Ladenburg not only personally marketed my exhibition by handing out posters and postcards but also arrived as a family with a HUGE beautiful basket of their amazing fruit for all visitors on the night to enjoy.

Well, enough of me…here is the exhibition through is eyes.

I had a nice visit with Mannheimer Morgan journalist, Hans-Jürgen Emmerich a few days before our Vernissage (opening) of the Ladenburg exhibition.
Here is a translation from the interview above:

When and how did you get into photography?

In 2003, While working as a museum designer for the US Army in Würzburg, my bosses saw some of my  and they gave me an amazing opportunity.  For 2 weeks I was a reportage
Photographer in France documenting 1st Infantry Division soldiers as they performed Memorial day ceremonies around France.

Since when you live in Europe, since when in Ladenburg?

I have been lucky enough to live in Germany and Belgium on and off since 1991.   I have lived in Ladenburg for the past 4 years.  That is why I decided to give this exhibition now with all the local Military leaving we have no idea if we will be here next year.  I did not want to miss the chance to say Thank you to Ladenburg.

Which camera do you prefere?

I can’t really say I have a favorite camera. Each camera teaches me something new, each camera shows me a different way of seeing.  If I have to pick I would say I love my Rolleiflex 2,8 GX….but I love working with my Ansco Large Format Studio Camera as working with a camera that large, it is like dance.  We must be in harmony to produce a great image.  I guess that is with all cameras.

How often do you use the iPhone to take pictures?

EVERYDAY!! I love my iPhone….it is wonderfully freeing to not have to carry heavy gear.

Which images you selected for your exhibition at Ladenburg?

A German friend of mine used the word AUGENBLICK to describe the images I chose for this exhibition.  Moments  where the light  was magical, a feeling of fantasy or a touch of the fairy tale that is present in the daily life  here in Ladenburg.  At least in my American Perspective.  Presently I have 30 images chosen, that can always change in the next two weeks as I never stop working, 15 of them are hand printed using the historic technique called Albumen printing.  This process was invented in 1850′s, where you coat paper with a mixture of egg whites and salt and then later sensitize the paper with Silver Nitrate.  The prints are then produced using UV light or the sun in a contact print frame.  The result is a rich print with an amazing finish.

Is there a favorite motif in Ladenburg?

There is so much to love about Ladenburg that picking one motif is difficult, but if I must pick, for me it is the Landscape that captivates and inspires me.  The ever changing light and vast sky, each day pulls me out of my studio and into the streets and fields.

The exhibition will hang in the Ladenburg Rathaus from 15 October until 29 November.  The Vernissage or Opening is 15 October at 19:00.  The idea behind this exhibition is to say THANK YOU to all the wonderful people of Ladenburg for making me feel at home these past 4 years.

Sabine Prothmann, from the Ladenburg Blog said:

Everyone can snap photos, like a machine, but not everyone can observe “, with this quotation mayors Ziegler the photo exhibition of Laura Boston Thek, open by Friedrich Duerrenmatt: „Ladenburg – Eine Amerikanische Perspektive “.

50 visitors came, in order to admire along the gallery in the 1st upper floor of the Ladenburger of city hall with 40 photographs by the American. One hears enthusiastic comments again and again: „You really have a great eye “, „Do you really see these colors “, „Completely Fantastic “…

A new view of Ladenburg

The American Laura Boston Thek shows the Ladenburger visitors a new view of their city. It carries the viewer forward on through a migration and a journey by roads and house lines, between apple trees and asparagus fields the view of details, emphasizes.

In black-and-white it shows us details of the city, from statues, coat of arms, house fronts. Poetically it inserts the color particularly with landscape photographs, the pictures shines unreal as into „Fruit OF their labors “, where she has photographed humans with the asparagus harvest or also in „Revealing landscape “, as the material rises like a veil over the landscape.

A photography of the City Gate, she calls „Laden-henge, and the admission of a Madonna statue in the market square „Under the watchful Eye “.

Laura Boston Thek leaves the reality, but does not make it unreal

„I say “, thus Ziegler (Mayor) in his greetings thank you for this view. „Laura Boston Thek leaves the reality, but does not make it unreal, we gets the view sharpened “.

Since four years the artist has lived in Ladenburg, with her husband, who works for the US-Army. Perhaps they would have soon return to the US, a loss for Ladenburg, stresses the mayor.

Daily the photographer with their dog and many cameras investigates the roads and places and the environment of the city.

These wanders made the artist in Ladenburg popular and well-known, with their joyfulness and cordialness have helped her developed a relationship with many people and she identifies herself with our city “, tells Ziegler.

„In my heart I am a Ladenburgerin “, says Boston Thek only with this loving and observing eye could these marvelous photographs develop.

The heart plays a crucial role

With her photography the heart a crucial role, her observations and impressions plays created by her heart translates directly on the paper was brought, describes the mayor the work process by the photographer.

It is one „ingenious mixture of the ability, light, landscape, humans, to catch details and a doings of humans “in the photographs says Mayor Ziegler. The viewer experiences in such a way city, culture and humans from an American perspective – „cultures come so to each other “.

Boston Thek shows us pictures, which we do not see with our own eyes after living in Ladenburg so long, her candid photographs sharpens our view for the beauty and detail. “For it we thank you very much”, says Mayor Ziegler.

On her website Laura Boston Thek writes: “DAILY I walk, compelled to capture with my camera, the ever changing beauty surrounding me. Taking photos is a path to healing my wandering soul.”

The exhibition can be visited still by 29 November 2010 in the 1st upper floor of the city hall during the opening times: On Mondays to on Wednesdays from 9:00 to 12:30 clock and from 14:00 to 17:00 clock and Thursday of 9:00 to 12:00 clock and 14:00 to 18:00 clock.
Ladenburg Blog

After beating my head to design a proper Poster to market the collection an amazing college friend from Ringling stepped in and created this incredible marketing package for me. Curry Mendes’ skills are endless and to him I am ever grateful.

You can catch “Eine Amerikanische Perspektive” at the Ladenburg Rathaus from
15 October thru 29 November 2010.

Today I finished one part of the presentation, a new book.

Ladenburg An American Perspective

I hope you will stop by and check it out!

I am happy to announce, after a month of concentrated hard work, we revealed our work in Brussels this past weekend at the Brussels Accessible Art Fair.   The best way for me to describe the event for you is it was like Christmas morning for me.  After spending the past 3 years making every one’s gifts, I was blessed to watch their faces as they opened and discovered each image…each gift.

Honestly I was overwhelmed by the reaction of people to my simple images.  They really did get it!  Many said the subject matter was of ordinary things, shown in an extraordinary way…that each image was a magical moment captured on paper.

One key moment that sticks in my mind was when a British woman arrived with her son and they fell in love with the image of the bee frozen in air about to land on a poppy.  She told me the only reason her 9 year old was coming with her to the art fair was to see photographers.  I personally was floored by how so many of the children attending the event actually spent concentrated time in front of the images and paintings to admire them and enjoy them, but that is another story.  What I want to share with you is the fact that this Poppy loving woman bought the print and her son, the 9 year old bought a framed print of my image “Time Portal” where light is pouring through the forest and appears as a doorway in time.  We spoke together about the image at length and I told him how I believed it to be Narnia.  His mother kindly left her framed image with us on the booth wall  for the next three days but her son insisted he wanted to hang his in his room….THAT NIGHT.

I was so incredibly honored.  Actually I was so incredibly honored by all the people who came and spent time with me, listening to my stories, showed me support and all my friends and their endless belief in me and my work.

The weekend felt like a year to me, in the most wonderful way.  Though I was tired, I sort of wished it would never end as I was drawing such positive energy from everyone I met.

I wanted to make sure to take time while it was fresh in my mind to share this all with you and to say THANK YOU for your time and support.

This was ONE GIANT STEP for Laura kind!

Of course it has been a struggle both physically and financially to pull together an entireshow of stock, (57 pieces in all)  in one months time, but I have learned a great deal in the process.  I can say now that it is VERY true that the hardest part of being a photographer is actually the pricing of your work.  After many pleading emails to all my amazingly talented photo friends and hours of Internet research, I learned it is a very personal process mixed in with a bit of math.  You never really know if you were correct until the day….so I will have to let you know how I did after the event.,

Many times over this past month, while I worked I marveled at how a life’s worth of knowledge picked up here and there, all are drawn upon and are ready in reserve when needed.  My museum knowledge helps for design and archival needs.  My Father passing along his construction knowledge to me during my childhood comes in with the framing, my painters eye is everywhere.

With all the work now  matted and framed with archival materials, signed and numbered with certificates of authenticity mounted on the back paper, just the final blue foam protectors are placed on each to ensure the 5 hour drive awaiting them is a safe one.

My team, husband and dog, are also thankfully accompanying me.  What would I be with out them, for it is my dog that gets me out shooting in all weather and it is my husband’s constant encouragement and faith in my creative process that spurs me ever forward.  It is he who first put a computer and camera on the desk of this stubborn artist while I complained I saw no need for it in a painters life.  Boy do I ever look back at that declaration and laugh.

I wish you all could be there in Brussels cheering me on and raising a drink with me as I begin this new challenge…..and teach this old dog…many new tricks!
Great Light to you ALL