Tim Hawkinson | Octopus | Cindy Sherman | Untitled Film Still #82 | Robert Glenn Ketchum | Lakeshore in Morning Fog | Abelardo Morell | Camera Obscura Image of the Grand Tetons in Resort Room, Jackson Hole, Wyoming | John Sanchez | Rachel Rosenthal, Artist | Mitch Epstein | Buena Vista, Colorado | Leland Rice | Volkswagen With Figure | Catherine Wagner | The Lamps of 1900 | Ned Sloane | Telephone Pole Piece, Los Angeles: Photograph of Kim Jones | Andrew Freeman | #3.4.04- Don Becker's Garage & Guesthouse, Independence, California N36O.48.229 - W118O.11.620 | Ken Gonzales-Day | Franklin Avenue (1920) | Jo Ann Callis | Man in Tie | Bruce Nauman | Burning Small Fires (Artist Book) | Annie Leibovitz | Scarlett Johansson, Chateau Marmont, West Hollywood | David Maisel | Oblivion 1382-52p | Gilbert B. Weingourt | Timothy Leary | Richard Misrach | Untitled (Ocotillo) | Edward Steichen | Sylvia Sidney, Hollywood | Ruben Ochoa | Fwy Wall Extraction | Hunter S. Thompson and others | From "Gonzo" | Henry Wessel | Las Vegas No. 15 | James Fee | Epiphany | John Baldessari | Face (with Red Nose): Plus Four Alternate Noses | Anthony Hernandez | Everything #2 | Ansel Adams | Graduation dress | Loretta Ayeroff | Mountain View, Edris Drive | Grant Mudford | Walt Disney Concert Hall, Under Construction #7 | Frederick Sommer | Stendhal | Tina Modotti | Interior of the Church Tower at Tepotzotlan | Henri Cartier-Bresson | Mexico City | Irving Penn | Hell's Angels, San Francisco | William Dassonville | From Glacier Point | Christina Fernandez | Fashion International | Mark Laita | Air Traffic Controller, Todd Phipps, Palmdale, California, May 5, 2006
Juggler, Sergey Gripkov, Los Angeles, February 21, 2000 | Mark Wyse | Untitled Landscape | U.S. Air Force 1352nd Photographic Group, Lookout Mountain Station | Sugar, 1.2 Kilotons, Nevada | Julius Shulman | Von Sternberg Residence, Northridge | Joaquin Trujillo | Amy, Los Ninos | Robert Heinecken | Shiva Manifesting as a Single Mother | Han Nguyen | Tsunami | Melanie Einzig | Bikram Yoga Instructor, North Beach, San Francisco | John Patrick Salisbury | Untitled No. 134 | Karen Halverson | Gamble House Entry | Bill Owens | 4th of July Parade, Pleasanton, California | Catherine Opie | My Studio, Suzanne's Work | Eliot Porter | Reflections in Pool, Escalante River, Utah | Adam Bartos | Los Angeles | Stan Honda | From the Heart Mountain Barracks Project | Hiromu Kira | The Thinker | Jeff Mermelstein | Yosemite National Park, California | Lewis Baltz | West Wall, Unoccupied Industrial Structure, 20 Airway Drive, Costa Mesa | Dennis Hopper | Robert Irwin | Hansel Mieth and Otto Hagel | S.F. Water Front | Edward Burtynsky | Oxford Tire Pile #8, Westley, California | Beahan & McPhee | Almond Trees and Flood Irrigation, Oakdale | Larry Sultan | Boxers, Mission Hills | Isabel Gomes | Blue Horizon, Santa Rosa Island | Edward Weston | Cabbage Leaf | Anthony Friedkin | Offshore Winds, Zuma Beach | Richard Long | Donner Pass Circle: Along a 20 Day Walk from Ebbetts Pass to the North Fork Feather River Sierra Nevada California 2005 | John Swope | Dorothy McGuire, Beverly Hills | Hans-Christian Schink | LA Night #1 | Herve Friend | Redlands From Smiley Hill | Joel Sternfeld | Queen of the Prom, the Range Nightclub, Slab City, California |
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| Robert Glenn Ketchum Lakeshore in Morning Fog 1972/2000 © Robert Glenn Ketchum; courtesy Amon Carter Museum LL/19439 Photo Synthesis
Colin Westerbeck
This photograph is in the "Golden Age" exhibition at Rohrer Fine Art, Laguna Beach, through May 31.
Though Robert Glenn Ketchum's work has received some museum attention, most recently at the Amon Carter in Texas, it isn't universally appreciated in the art world. His color landscapes are too lush; he's sometimes regarded as a latter-day Pictorialist or calendar artist. Still, he believes in his work unequivocally. He's unapologetic, even defiant, in the face of any rejection. I've always admired that.
This photograph was made in 1972 at Lake McDonald in Glacier National Park. But the version you see here was created in 2000 in China, by hand embroidery. A sheer background was laid over the photographic print so that it could be copied with calligraphic brushes. Then traditional embroiderers stitched the image in fine thread on a silk polymer matrix. The only problem the reproduction presented was the rock in the foreground, because all rocks in Chinese embroidery have a prescribed form called Taihu rocks and new improvisations were required.
The result is that Ketchum's already vibrant colors are even more intense and insistent. He's done a number of these embroidered reproductions, and I believe this is what he likes about them. They draw upon a tradition that really knows how to appreciate color Pictorialism.
[Originally published in West Magazine : May 6, 2007, p.9]
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