Product:SUNDAY Date:04-29-2007Desk: SPC-0009-CMYK/20-04-07/14:19:48
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SUNDAY, APRIL 29, 2007
H
TORONTO STAR
H
G9
PHOTO FINISH
Until 20 years ago, when artists
started trading in their paint-
brushes for cameras, photogra-
phy wasn’t considered art. Now
it’s the stuff of curators, critics,
collectors and dealers around
the world.
“I think it’s exciting on a num-
ber of fronts,” says one of those
dealers, Toronto’s Stephen Bul-
ger. “The surge of activity start-
ed when contemporary artists
started using photography as a
means of delivery. But then peo-
ple grew interested in other
photographers, like Diane Ar-
bus and Robert Frank.
“After that they started to look
at work done by European ex-
perimental photographers be-
tween the two world wars. Now
the market is huge.”
Though prices for photo-
graphs can’t match those for Old
Masters, Impressionists and
Post-Impressionists, one pic-
ture, by French photographer
Henri Cartier-Bresson, sold re-
cently for $3 million (U.S.).
In other words, photography is
hot.
But as Bulger explains, there’s
more to the printed image than
meets the eye. For example, the
same piece by, say, the late
American landscape photogra-
pher Ansel Adams, can fetch
anywhere between $60,000 and
$600,000 (U.S.).
The critical factor is the date of
the print; generally speaking,
the earlier the better. Consider
that an unlimited number of
copies can be made from one
negative, and you can see why
connoisseurs prefer vintage. “A
vintage print is a photograph
made at the same time the nega-
tive was made,” Bulger says. “A
lot of people are interested in
the very first photograph. It has
more historical significance.
Andre Kertesz’s vintage prints
sell for $1 million, prints from
the 1950s and ’60s are $80,000
and prints around 1980 are
worth about $40,000. But be-
cause of its reproducibility, you
can always buy an original.
“Vintage prints have an au-
thenticity to them, a patina. But
if you’re just starting, or work-
ing with a lower budget, you can
still buy an original photograph.
Each is worth its price.”
And as demand grows, so does
interest in photographers who
never thought of themselves as
artists. Arbus, for example, took
pictures for books and for maga-
zine articles, some of which she
also wrote.
“Though vintage Arbus works
are very hard to find – and very
expensive — posthumous prints
are now being made in editions
of 75.
“It’s a much more global mar-
ket place now,” Bulger contin-
ues. “When I go to art fairs, 90
per cent of the material I put on
the wall in places like New York
is Canadian. Fifteen years ago, I
would only have put up prints by
famous photographers, such as
Ansel Adams and Cartier-Bres-
son.
“Ed Burtynsky is everywhere
these days. He overshadows ev-
eryone else in the field right
now.
“As for Jeff Wall, whom I don’t
even consider a photographer,
demand for his work is unbe-
lievable. There are people
around the world who think he’s
the best.”
The Vancouver-based artist,
whose elaborate tableaux are
based on historical paintings, is
currently featured in a solo ex-
hibition at the Museum of Mod-
ern Art in New York.
One of Bulger’s other favourite
Canadian photographers is
Richard Harrington. Though
not as celebrated as some, Har-
rington was one of a handful of
practitioners hired by the Na-
tional Film Board’s Still Divi-
sion to document Canada.
Bulger rightly calls him “one of
the great figures of Canadian
photography.”
When he died in 2005, he was
best known for a series of por-
traits he produced in the 1950s
that depicted native life in the
Canadian Arctic. The pictures,
which showed starving Inuit,
caused a national scandal. Half a
century later, they have lost
none of their power to enlight-
en, engage, as well as to disturb.
“He was a humanist, and also
interested in culture,” Bulger
says. “He wasn’t just a journalist
but a social documentarian.”
Bulger has organized a retro-
spective of Harrington’s work
that will run at his gallery, 1026
Queen St. W., from June 14 to
July 21. It will include some of
the photographer’s famous Arc-
tic pictures, as well as others
taken in China and the Far East
.
Frame
work
These pictures, by the late Canadian photographer Richard Harrington, documented Inuit life in the 1950s. With the interest in the
printed image growing, collectors of art are giving the brush to paintings while keeping a keen focus on the photography market.
PHOTOS ARE NOW A FOCAL
POINT FOR HOME DÉCOR,
WRITES
CHRISTOPHER HUME
Sitting in a bright sunroom in
her Danforth home, Lee Davis
Creal is surrounded by what she
calls “nature’s art.”
Old Mother Nature may not
actually have snapped the neat-
ly matted photographs lying on
the couch, but she is certainly
responsible for the subject mat-
ter: surreal whorls of ice, with
glistening striations, formed in
sheets along the edge of a river
in the wilderness.
“Isn’t this amazing? I was just
blown away,” exclaims Creal,
with infectious enthusiasm. “I
was just fascinated by the for-
mations. I’d never seen any-
thing like it.”
Creal, 61, doesn’t consider her-
self an artist, but she’s always
had a “strong interest” in art,
and this is not the first time her
love of nature has taken her in
artistic directions.
Her little Sony digital camera
is her constant companion. In
the past, she has done series of
photographs on frogs, sheep,
starfish and ancient Scottish
stones. “I’ve always taken pho-
tos,” she says, “whenever I’m
just caught by something.”
Most of her past efforts have
been turned into cards, or
framed for gifts; but the “ice” se-
ries is destined for bigger things
— literally.
“I’m going to be working with
them for awhile,” she says. “I
want to explore how big I can
make them. I think these could
be spectacular framed photo-
graphs.”
There’s little doubt that, even-
tually, they will be a striking wall
adornment in her home, amidst
her already-impressive art col-
lection.
Creal’s affinity for the natural
world is nurtured by a property
called Sanctuary North, which
she and her husband, retired
humanities professor Michael
Creal, manage on behalf of a
non-profit organization they
started six years ago.
Situated along the York River,
near Bancroft, Ont., the small
cottage on 40 hectares offers
new refugees to Canada the op-
portunity to “experience the
Canadian wilderness” — during
the summer, obviously.
Small groups of refugees and
volunteers from five different
refugee communities reserve
days to visit the cottage, and
help to maintain and develop it.
“It’s community-building,”
Creal explains. “It brings to-
gether people from all over the
world. They just love it. And the
food is wonderful!”
The project is run completely
by volunteers and with no gov-
ernment funding.
Not surprisingly, Creal follows
through with her love for natu-
ral art even in the midst of the
wilderness. She has decorated
the cottage walls with a series of
framed photographs, taken by a
friend, of the wildflowers found
in the area.
“It’s a way of educating (the
visitors) about the environ-
ment.”
She thinks homemade art is
easy to achieve these days — dig-
ital cameras offer high-quality
images, and the photographs on
the couch beside her were
printed off her home computer.
“It’s something you could defi-
nitely do yourself, with today’s
technology.”
For Creal, the crucial ingredi-
ent to this kind of art is sponta-
neity — an openness to the
beauty that surrounds us every-
where.
“Nature is just full of surpris-
es,” she says. “I guess you can
create your own images, but
when you think of so much
that’s already there. . .I think if
you actually go out looking for
photographs, you don’t get
them. It just happens.
“It’s just about being alert, vi-
sually, to what’s around you.”
AARON LYNETT/TORONTO STAR
Lee Davis Creal creates her own décor with nature photography, much of it taken around Sanctuary North, a rustic holiday escape for
refugees in cottage country. Her latest project is a series of photos of ice formations during spring thaw on the lake, top.
Collaborating with nature
LEE DAVIS CREAL LOOKS FOR DRAMA AND WHIMSY IN NATURE, SAYS
DONNA YAWCHING
