Professional Photographer

December 06, 2000

John Sexton is internationally respected as a photographer, master print maker, workshop instructor, and lecturer. He is best known for his luminous black and white images of the natural environment and humankind's technological monuments. His latest publication, "Places of Power," is now available at PhotoAlley.

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Photo Alley: Welcome to the PhotoAlley.com Forum. Tonight's special guest is John Sexton. John is here to answer any questions you have about his work, and about black and white photography in general. Welcome to the Forum, John!

John Sexton: It's great to be here, and I'll do my best to answer whatever questions you have. I have absolutely no secrets, so ask away!

Ed: John, I love your work. Did you have any experiences you would like to share from your time spent compiling your books? Did you find compiling the books a difficult challenge as compared to your photography?

John Sexton: I would say that compiling a book must be something like having a child, but I have no first-hand experience. It's a slow and sometimes painful process, but when completed, I have found it to be very rewarding. The process of gathering the photographs, along with making the images themselves, is an interesting opportunity to look back over time and see how one has changed through the photographs. One of the most difficult things is selecting which images to include and which are not going to make it into the final selection included in the book.

Photo: Would you describe your new book for us?

John Sexton: "Places of Power The Aesthetics of Technology" is quite a change in subject matter for me. There are four different subject areas included in the book; Ancient Anasazi Sites, Hoover Dam, Steam Power Plants and the Space Shuttle. This project began in 1987 when I somewhat unexpectedly found myself photographing in a steam power plant in Wisconsin. Just months prior to that experience, I had made my first photograph that I thought was successful of an ancient Anasazi site. The Anasazi images seemed like a logical extension of my long-term photographic love affair with the landscape. The power plant experience seemed somewhat incongruous to my other photographs. It was three years later at the conclusion of my first day photographing at Hoover Dam, again a somewhat unexpected experience, that I imagined the project Places of Power and realized that the common denominator between the seemingly unrelated subjects was the beauty of human technological achievements through time, and it was at that very moment that I imagined the conclusion of the project and the book photographs of the Space Shuttle representing a symbol of today's technology to me.

Missy: I really am in awe of your shot of water flowing from the Nevada stilling basin, how long did it take you to get that shot?

John Sexton: I'm glad that you like the photograph. It's actually an image that turned out somewhat better than I expected when I was making the exposure! This image was made in 1999 on my final photographic visit to Hoover Dam finishing work on the book. It was afternoon, and I was wandering the Nevada side of the dam photographing another cascading water area when I realized that there might be a photograph a few 100 yards away. When I set up the 4x5 camera and looked at the ground glass, I was excited by the abstract nature of the arrangement of the water and the concrete elements. What surprised me when I actually saw the print for the first time in the darkroom was how abstract the image had turned out and the way all of the concrete forms had an almost "cubist" look or feel. What is surprising to some people is the sense of scale in the image. What you're actually looking at is 100-200 feet of vertical drop on the water. It's big!

Jenny: What courses or lessons etc did you attend in order to gain more schooling as a professional photographer or to better your work?

John Sexton: That's a good question. I was fortunate enough to have an EXCELLENT photographic instructor in high school. His name was Olaf Lee and what he did for me was not only to provide information but also inspiration. He encouraged me, must to the disappointment of my parents, to major in photography when I attended college, and that's what I did. I first studied photography at a community college in Southern California, near where I'd grown up, called Cypress College. There I found more instructors that were truly excited about photography, and they were kind enough to share with me their expertise. I was very fortunate to find such dedicated and skilled instructors. My primary emphasis of study at that time was industrial advertising photography, and I thought I wanted to work in a corporate environment perhaps for an aerospace firm or something such as that as a photographer. That desire changed dramatically in 1973 when I attended my first photography workshop. It was a two-week-long experience in Yosemite, and the workshop was lead by Ansel Adams. I found that a truly inspiration and exciting experience. Not only did I learn from Ansel, but he had gathered together a staff of very talented and dedicated photographers at that workshop. I later went on to get a Bachelor's Degree in art with an emphasis in photography and attended a number of other workshops, having an opportunity to study with other photographers, Wynn Bullock, Paul Caponigro, Brett Weston and others. I gained a great deal from the workshop experience, but if I had not had a good foundation of excellent photographic instruction from my photography teachers, I don't think I would have been ready for the workshop experience.

Jenny: Have you ever tried color photography as an art? If yes, what were your impressions of it?

John Sexton: Yes. Actually, when I first became seriously interested in photography during my first year of photographic studies in college, color was my primary emphasis. It was during the Ansel Adams workshop that I decided that I wanted to concentrate on black and white photography for my own personal work to the exclusion of color. Of course I knew that as I continued my photographic studies in college, I would have to do assignments in color, and of course I would have to do commercial assignments in color as well. However for my own personal work, I decided the best way to try and gain control over the medium of black and white was to concentrate on it exclusively, and I did so for 10 years, from 1973 until 1983. In 1983, I lead a photographers’ cultural exchange to the People's Republic of China. I actually knew very little about China, and when I learned that I would be leaving this trip, I tried to avoid looking at photographs of that vast country by others. As I was preparing and thinking about what I might find in a place so large that I knew so little about, it dawned on me that one of my favorite colors in painting and drawing class in college had been Chinese red. Based upon that naive interest, I decided that I wanted to try and make color photographs while in China, and most of the work that I've done while in China during three trips in the mid 80s is actually color. I chose color negative film because it would be somewhat similar in terms of the method of exposure that I use for black and white, and I found an excellent color printer named Wally MacGalliard. Prior to going on my first trip to China, I ran a number of tests which Wally processed and printed, and he guided me toward exposure index I should use to provide him with a negative that he would like to print from. The colors that I found in China were soft and subtle, and that's what I attempted to convey in my color prints. I have exhibited them only a couple of times and recently had my portfolio box out to look at them myself and really rather liked them to be honest. I guess since I'm primarily a black and white photographer, most of the colors aren't very bright or saturated! One of the limiting factors in the medium of color for me is a slight lack of control that I have in black and white. I'm sure that much of that is merely practice. If I wanted to give advice to someone wanting to improve his or her photography, it would be to concentrate on a particular approach to the medium. If you truly love color, concentrate on color. If you're enamored with black and white, make that your emphasis. One of the keys to controlling the medium technically and aesthetically is practice.

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