This Saturday, January 25, from 2 p.m. to 3 p.m., the Field Library Art Gallery will host an Artist Talk featuring Peekskill photographers Joe Squillante and Dan Florin. The discussion will cover Dan Florin’s background in photography, his previous careers outside of photography, and how, after his recent retirement from teaching, he came back full circle with all of his energies devoted to his love of photography.
In an exhibition titled “Altered Perceptions,” about 30 of Dan Florin’s photographs are currently on display until January 30 on the mezzanine level of The Field Library.
“Dan Florin is a fine arts photographer choosing to stick to film as his choice of art rather than switching over to digital photography, except when working in color,” Joe Squillante told Peekskill Herald. “His work evokes a feeling in a quiet deep way. It’s all quiet and calming and dream-like, especially in black and white photographs.”
Dan Florin is currently interim president of Peekskill Arts Alliance. He recently retired as a teacher with Yonkers Public Schools, and now devotes his time to photography. “Dan first was given a camera at the age of 13,” said Squillante. “He said it provided him a purpose and a way to find the unusual. From that point on, he has never stopped seeking that purpose.”
Florin’s photographs are empirical in nature: he creates them in a way that makes the viewer stop, have an immediate reaction based on its face value, and ponder the photograph while thinking about experiences in their life.
For more information about Dan Florin, visit his website at www.danflorin.com/ and follow Dan on Facebook and Instagram.
Here is how Peekskill resident and Peekskill Arts Alliance member Dan Florin has created the more than 30 photographs in his solo exhibition, “Altered Perceptions,” at the Field Library Art Gallery…
For professional photographers and artists alike, there is an art form to creating photographs. It entails the type of camera to use, whether to use film or digital, choosing a subject, and camera settings, composure, light and composition. If the photographer chooses a digital camera, they can manipulate settings to alter a picture immediately or they can do it on their computer.
If the photographer uses film, there is more work and a handmade process that must be followed — from developing film by hand and creating negatives to using an enlarger, photographic paper and light to create prints. All of it is done in a dark room, where the magic happens. That is where the photographer can alter the pictures to what they envision. Changing the amount of light and how long it seeps through the enlarger alters a photograph. The artist also can take two negatives and overlap them, creating double negative prints or use dodging and burning techniques to lighten or darken areas of an image.
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