Art Tuesday: Pete Eckert
By Webster Dictionary, Photography is the art of capturing images by the action of radiant energy and especially light on a sensitive surface (as film or a CCD chip). The image is defined as the optical counterpart of an object produced by an optical device (as a lens or mirror) or an electronic device; a visual representation of something. Visual, of, relating to, or used in vision; attained or maintained by sight. Using this 3 definitions you may conclude that to photograph is to capture something that you see. But can we only "see with our sight"?
Peter Eckert is a carpenter who was trained in sculpture and industrial design. He was also on his way to becoming an architect at Yale until he was diagnosed with Retinitis Pigmentosa, a condition that leads to permanent blindness. After losing his sight, he was so afraid of not being able to take care of himself, that he enrolled in Martial Arts classes, achieving black belt, and went back to college to obtain an MBA. Eckert:2, Blindness:0
In 2008, he won the Artist Wanted "Exposure" competition. His medium? Photography.
(Eckert: 3, Blindness: 0)
"One day I was cleaning out a drawer and found my mother in laws’ old camera. She had passed away a few years earlier. I like mechanical things, so Amy found me fooling with it. I asked her to describe the settings to me so I could figure out how to use the 1950’s Kodak. I found the camera fascinating and discovered it had an infrared setting. I thought a blind guy doing photos in a non-visible wavelength would be amusing. I was hooked. I knew nothing about film or manual cameras." (excerpt from his website)
(c) Pete Eckert
(c) Pete Eckert
His images look like out of a surrealist world, a dream world: Men made out of light, shadows, blurry. It's like a combination of how he remembers the world with how the camera can capture it. He photographs places he visited before going blind, and with the help of his other senses, especially his hearing, he positions his camera and makes the shots. His lack of sight frees him from the rules of traditional imagery but at the same time makes him more grounded in everything that surrounds him. He has friends who help him in the darkroom, but only after the image is already in a contact sheet. He does all the process himself, from setting the camera, developing the film, and doing the contact print. He asks for feedback, where his imagination cannot reach.
"I could cut sighted people completely out of my process. I could do a write up about the event of taking the photos. The negatives, contact sheets, and write up about the event could be the final product. I like doing the dramatic large prints better. I want sighted people involved. It is a good bridge between the blind and sighted. I want to be included in the world and accepted."
(c) Pete Eckert
(c) Pete Eckert
His dedication makes my complaints during the long hours in the darkroom back in my MFA days totally lame. But sure gives me the motivation to keep experiment and creating in this medium I love. He gives the phrase "Don't give up, get even" a whole new meaning! Eckert: 4, blindness: 0 (Take that, Blindness!)
...And to you who are reading, what's your excuse? ;)
**If you want to know more about him, visit his website Pete Eckert or watch the biography video made for the Artist Wanted