Blending old and modern techniques to create new images

Tuxedo High School students are ‘artists of the month’ at Greenwood Lake Library Greenwood Lake - Ten Tuxedo High School art students will exhibiting their photographic images at the Greenwood Lake Public Library’s Works of Art Gallery through the month of April. “This work was developed by students using cameras that they made themselves using a technique that is many centuries’ old - called pinhole cameras,” said George F. Baker High School art teacher Leslie Hanes. “As far back as Leonardo Da Vinci, it was discovered that a single opening held up to the light would act as funnel for light and would reflect the image in front of it back onto another surface. In the middle 1800s, with the discovery of photosensitive materials, this concept was used along with glass lenses to create the camera.” Students at George F. Baker High School in Tuxedo created their own cameras and shot the work and processed it in a black and white darkroom. As in the case of the “Slinky” photo by Anne-Marie Campbell, students took time-lapse pictures of 30-90 second exposures. The images were then printed, with color added in some cases using Photoshop. The final images up to 12 x 12 in size. As in the case of “Jack in the Box” by Brynn Trusewicz, Hanes said, the students learned to use Polaroid peel-apart film and copy existing pictures. After copying the image Brynn peeled apart the Polaroid film and pressed it down on watercolor paper to create the final work, Hanes said. “The students exhibited here range from grades 9-12 and had little prior experience with photography. This course also covered photographic history, composition, along with some Photoshop and darkroom techniques,” Hanes said. “The final goal of the course was to make fine aesthetic choices and create images that are visually powerful. I think that the pictures speak for themselves.” The exhibit will run from Sunday, April 1, through Wednesday, April 25, and will be open during the library’s regular operating hours - Mondays and Fridays (9 a.m. to 5 p.m.), Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays (9 a.m. to 9 p.m.), Saturdays (10 a.m. to 4 p.m.), and Sundays (11 a.m. to 3 p.m.). For information, contact the library’s gallery coordinator Kelly Corrado by telephone at 477-8377 or by e-mail at kcorrado@rcls.org.