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 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

While I stood there a local vineyard worker saw my expression and started a conversation with me about the work. He told me that they are building a tunnel that will go under the vineyard and the houses on the hill. That it is very important as the old medieval road currently used is very dangerous and far too heavy with traffic. This would be a very good thing for the villagers as well as commuters.

Each time we find ourselves in the area, Clover and I join the line of elderly men and children, and stop to watch the work develop. Just recently they have finished the road up to the mountain and we are minutes away from the tunneling to begin. While we stood watching, taking some videos and photos, a man tapped me on the shoulder and said, “Your taking historic photos”…I smiled and agreed.

It was a fantastic learning experience for me and I now know for me to continue working with this process I definitely need a dark box or mobile darkroom.  It also showed me in greater detail the limitations this process creates…I have started my list of accessible locations and also my mind is spinning as to how to make getting the dark box to certain locations possible.  Very exciting.

Seeing these beautiful ruins captured in this Historic Technique was breathtaking.  These images Quinn captured on this day will be exhibited in London at the Frederick Scott Archer Ceremony

Please take a moment to view the small slideshow of images from the day and also take some time to look through Quinn’s amazing site and his many on going projects.

He started searching out where he could learn this type of photography and amazingly he found a Master of this craft living no less then 6 miles from our house here in Germany and to make it more interesting, he too was a temporarily transplanted American.

For the past 3 days my husband was given the opportunity to study one on one with this amazingly talented man who has been attributed with bringing back to Europe the lost art of Collodion Photography, Quinn Jacobson of Studio Q Photography.   His work is inspirational in so many ways.

I popped in for a few hours to do a sitting for my husband and also to document some of his progression.   Make sure to take a look at a few of these informative and inspiring links and view the slideshow I created of the many steps and alchemy of this ancient process.  In the next few blogs i hope to get my hubby to take you on a tour of each step using the photos so keep a look out for those blogs.

Quinn Jacobson Master of the Collodion Process
Collodion Wet Plate Process

Great light to you during this busy holiday season!

Why do you take pictures?
Because I must…it is like a disease for me not unlike alcoholism or
drug abuse….I shoot because I can’t stop shooting. There is just so
many amazing things to capture, and life and nature are constantly
changing. It is the subtleties that attract me, the way the light
folds around a tree that I see each day, when on this particular day,
it captures my attention. It demands my rapt attention.

What has impacted your visual style?
I would have to say my family history. Some families have Doctors or
Lawyers in them….mine, as far back as is recorded…have been
artistically driven. I joke that we have inherited the gene for
composition. It just seems so natural to us.

How did you learn to see?
It was my mother who first taught me to see light and beauty in the
world around me…and to develop my imagination. Being a painter
herself she had one particular painting she had done, of a thatched
roof cottage in a typically English garden, surrounded by a dense
wood. In mornings after my father went to work and my brother to
school…I would crawl into my mother’s bed and together we would sip
an imaginary tea that would shrink us down so we could frolic inside
this amazing landscape together…discovering all it’s textures and
magic hidden with in. It is those special moments in childhood that
train our brains how to view life.

In your world is photography mechanical or philosophical?
I guess philosophical, but I don’t think of it in those terms. I use
photography and in that sense Art, as a kind of medicine for my
soul. I believe you create the world around you by the filter you
view it through…so I am alway searching for the perfect light or the
perfect perspective to help illuminate me. When things get out of
control around me, I know I can always create that special magical
world I enjoyed when I was a little girl..through my lens or on the
smooth surface of my canvas.

What is your favorite 15×100 image?
THAT is an impossible question to answer…as the work here in 15×100
is constantly developing and growing as are the artists represented
here. Each day I find I have a new favorite…actually I discover a
new favorite with each viewing. It is too diverse a group to pick
just one.

Who is your favorite 15×100 photographer? Why?
Oh, man, that is one tough question. I am just starting to
familiarize myself with many of the talented people here at 15×100.
Some I think of as old friends, but many are just waiting to be
discovered. I have drawn so much inspiration from so many here and I
always carry around in my head their different approaches to
photography. When I am in the field and stuck, unable to think of a
new way to shoot something I think…how would Matt or Maria shoot
this…or perhaps I see ice forms in a puddle and think…how would
the Charles approach this with his amazing eye for the abstract.
Rory’s love of rustic shacks has always made me go back and shoot a
few extra varied angles while walking the vineyards. Michael Van Der
Tol’s texture rich imagery inspired me to bring my two creative halves
together in my imagery. A marriage of painting and photography.
More than once I have attempted the spontaneous work created by Joe
Rotindo. Paul Collins has never stopped being an inspiration and a
guide to me on my journey. How can anyone pick just one?
How did you select your 15 images?
It was a hard process, but I wanted the work to be “fresh baked” as it
were. To be representative of what my eye was tracking at the moment
the gallery was conceived. I hope to keep updating the gallery
monthly, with each season or new experience inspiring the work.

What guides you?
My heart, is my true guide. I try to shoot when I feel this sort of
tug in my heart. I literally many times make an audible nose or have
a tear on my cheek when I press the shutter button….then I know I
have caught the energy of that moment. That is when I know I captured
something special.

Check out many more amazing photographers at: http://blog.15×100.com/