Memoria series

Winter strips the trees down to their innermost, leaving the bare branches stretched out in patient acceptance. They lie in wait, as we must if we enter a difficult wintertime of the soul, so leaves can burst
forth once more when the time is right. In the meantime, the trees are comforted by the memory of summers past and by visions of springs yet to come. The tiny twigs still clutch the last few precious leaves
of autumn as they sift the air for tidings of their beloved.

The trees in these photographs are from places that carry many memories for me, near where I live in the Santa Cruz mountains, and near where I grew up in Connecticut. Just as memories are built up over
time, forming complex webs of repetition and reinterpretation, the photographs in this series are built up from multiple exposures. Since my digital Hasselblad camera does not have the built-in ability to capture
multiple exposures, I had to create my own method. Covering the lens with a board, I leave the shutter open for a few minutes, periodically making exposures by letting light in through a slit in the board, and
moving the camera between exposures. Since I’m never sure quite what the result will be, the process is full of surprises and serendipity, just like the process of forming and finding memories.

The images themselves are varied, just like our memories. Some are light and ethereal, while others are darker, even brooding. Some are clearly recognizable as trees, while others are more abstract, further
removed from the original by all the built-up layers. Overall, I seek a contemplative and mysterious feeling in these images, as if from a secret, misty forest that lies partway between this world and another.
The simple geometric compositions contrast with the endless complexity of the branches receding into the distance. Various infuences for this series include looping music by Steve Reich and Zoe Keating,
fractal imagery, and works by Richard Diebenkorn, Cy Twombly, and Jackson Pollack.

The images are captured using a digital medium-format Hasselblad camera, and printed at 40” x 40” and 20” x 20” as archival pigment prints. I use a highly-textured paper and "oat the prints in the frames,
creating end results that resemble drawings, blurring the line between our external and internal realities, between this world and the world of our memories.

Impromptus series

The photographs in the Impromptus series celebrate the musical beauty of electric wires and telephone wires.  Some of the images focus on the lines’ simplicity and austerity, while others include a range of thick and thin wires, jagged and tangled ones, and intricate patterns of lines scattered across the page.  The result is an unexpected variety of rhythms, tempos, and moods. The lines and curves are punctuated by staccato passages of sitting birds, baroque tangles of wires, and the ornamentation of mysterious mechanical contraptions.

This series gets its name, Impromptus, from the musical pieces of the same name.  The photographs are meant to appear improvised and spontaneous, and some are whimsical while others are introspective.  The photographs explore the tension between order and chaos, between apparent spontaneity and careful underlying composition.  The simple white backgrounds let the range of lines and rhythms take the forefront, like a solo piano alone on the stage.

Ryan showed a strong interest in art since childhood, and first became involved with photography in college and graduate school.  Photography quickly evolved into a passion for him, and he developed an abstract style with which he explores the beauty hidden in everyday objects.  He is drawn to images that carry a certain meditative quality.  Part of this is achieved by using a sparse language of geometrical shapes, lines, and rhythms.  Furthermore, he often uses a narrow tonal range, so that the images are either overall dark or overall light, resulting in images that are contemplative, rather than emphatically assertive. 

 

 

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