Fritz Liedtke

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Astra Velum

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Fritz Liedtke Bio

Awards
2013	Rangefinder Alternative Processes Competition, Grand Prize, New York

2013	PDN Annual Award, New York

2012	Critical Mass Finalist

2011	Critical Mass Top 50 Award

2007	Critical Mass Finalist

2007	RACC Grant Award, Portland, Oregon

2004	Caldera Residency Award, Sisters, Oregon

2001	Tamron/Bronica Award, Portland, OR

2000	Photographer's Forum Black and White Competition First Place Award

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Solo Exhibitions
2012	Skeleton in the Closet, Alexander Brest Museum, Jacksonville, FL

2011	Skeleton in the Closet, Hartwick College Art Gallery, New York

2011	Skeleton in the Closet, Boise State University, Boise, ID

2011	Astra Velum, Gallery 291, San Francisco

2011	Astra Velum, Lightbox Photographic, Astoria, OR

2011	Astra Velum, Blue Sky Gallery, Portland, Oregon

2010	Quite Normal, CameraWork Gallery, Portland, OR

2010	Skeleton in the Closet, Pacific University Art Gallery, Forest Grove, OR

2009	Skeleton in the Closet, Washington State University, Richland, Washington

2007	Skeleton in the Closet, Littman Gallery, PSU, Portland, Oregon

2005	Secrets, White Gallery, PSU, Portland, OR

2002	Sightseers and Sights Unseen, Northview Gallery, Portland, OR

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Group Exhibitions
2013	Photography at the Edg, Newspace Center for Photography, Portland, OR

2013	Drawers, Blue Sky Gallery, Portland, OR

2012	Contents: Love, Anxiety, Happiness & Everything Else, Rayko Photo Center, San Francisco, CA

2012	Black and White, Newspace Center for Photography, Portland, Oregon

2012	The Body, Walter Anderson Gallery, Bridgewater, MA

2012	What's in a Face, Panopticon Gallery, Boston, MA

2012	TRUST, Pacific NW College of Art, Portland, OR

2012	X, Arte360 Gallery, Algeciras, Spain

2012	Beautiful My Desire, Wallspace Gallery, Santa Barbara, CA

2012	Beautiful My Desire, Wallspace Gallery, Seattle, WA

2010	Carnival, Newspace Center for Photography, Portland, OR

2010	Two of a Kind, Froelick Gallery, Portland, OR

2010	Photobook, Davis Orton Gallery, New York

2010	Portrait Revealed, Rayko Photo Center, San Francisco

2009	Self Portrait, Silver Eye Center for Photography, Pittsburgh

2007	Best, Benham Gallery, Seattle, WA

2006	Photography at Oregon, Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art, Eugene, OR

2005	One Foot After Another, Mark Woolley Gallery, Portland, Oregon

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Collections

Portland Art Museum, Portland, Oregon

Kresge Art Museum, Michigan State University, East Lansing Michigan

Museum of Fine Arts, Hourson, Houston, TX

Griffin Museum of Photography, Boston, MA

Scripps College Rare Books Collection, Claremont, CA

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Bibliography

Lenswork Magazine. Lenswork Publishing, 2013

Rangefinder Magazine. Nielsen, 2013

Professional Photogarapher Magazine. Lorna Gentry. PPA, 2012

Lensbaby. Corey Hilz. Focal Press, New York, 2012

The Norton Mix. Elizabeth Kessler. WW Norton, New York, 2012

Trust. PNCA, Portland, OR, 2012

Astra Velum. Fritz Liedtke. Fritz Liedtke Fine Arts, Portland, OR, 2012 (photo-eye Cat# ZF223H)

Diffusion. Blue Mitchell. OneTwelve, Portland, 2012 (photo-eye Cat# I1020)

Lenswork Magazine. Lenswork Publishing, 2011

Astra Velum. Fritz Liedtke. Fritz Liedtke Fine Arts, Portland, OR, 2011 (photo-eye Cat# ZE560L)

View Camera Magazine. 2011

Black and White Magazine. Susan Burnstine. London, 2011

PhotoLife Magazine. 2010

Silvershotz Magazine. 2010

Lenswork Magazine #89. Lenswork Publishing, 2010

High Desert Journal. 2007

Focus on Photography. Hermon Joyner. Davis Publications, Worcester, MA, 2007

Lenswork Magazine. Lenswork Publishing, 2006 (photo-eye Cat# LQ037)

Creative Vision. Jeremy Webb. Ava Books, London, 2005

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Education
	Pacific NW College of Art, BFA Photography and Printmaking

	George Fox University

Fritz Liedtke Statement

Artist Statement
Beauty is only skin deep. But ah! me; freckles go to the bone. ~Mark Twain

April, a freckled woman in this series, told me a story from her childhood: One day after playing outside, her grandmother asked her to go wash up. She went to the bathroom and did so, but grandma wasn’t satisfied. “Your face isn’t clean! Go scrub it some more!” The young girl was distraught, for all that was left on her skin were her freckles, and no amount of scrubbing would make them go away.

In a world that flaunts flawlessness as the ideal, can we find real beauty in the blemishes? More than once, while photographing for this series, women thanked me for making something beautiful out of what they often viewed as an imperfection.

At its essence, Astra Velum explores the beauty of flawed human skin, with its freckles and scars, overlaid upon us like a thin veil of stars.

Process Statement
This series is hand-printed by the artist as a limited edition set of photogravures.

I’ve used photogravure for this series for several reasons. First, in the digital age, I feel more and more distant from the handmade quality of photography — the manual labor of developing film and dodging and burning prints. But even darkroom work created a product that was made by hand, but showed no evidence of it. For this reason I’m drawn to processes like tintype, encaustic, and photogravure, which show clear evidence of the artist’s involvement with the final product.

While it’s one of the most complicated printing process, photogravure does have its advantages. I enjoy the craftiness of it—cutting out handmade paper for the chin-collé, inking and wiping the plate just so, the steady rhythm of turning the crank on the press, pulling the print off the plate and catching my breath, stunned by its beauty. I like the rounded corners of the plate, the indentation of the plate in the paper, the traces of unwiped ink at its edges, the occasional fingerprint. Like freckles, these are not flaws, but beauty marks.

Photogravure also offers a final product imitated but not reproduced by any other photographic printing medium: chin-collé. This method of impressing a second thin paper in between the ink and the backing paper is a traditional technique in printmaking. It consists of cutting a piece of paper—in my case, a handmade Japanese paper—the exact same size as the plate. When inked, the plate is placed on the press bed with the Japanese paper over top, and on top of that paper a glue is applied. Finally, the backing paper is placed in register over the plate and Japanese paper. This stack is run through the press, which exerts approximately 45,000 pounds of pressure on the sandwich of plate and papers. In doing so, the ink is pressed into the Japanese paper, which is glued and embossed into the backing paper. In this way, I create a unique print, with glowing warm high values (from the warm Japanese paper), placed against the white of the backing paper. The result is a hand-made print whose depth and luminescence is unmatched by any other photographic print-making process. They really must be seen in person to be fully appreciated.

I’m also drawn to the tactile nature of a photogravure. The papers used are often handmade, with a texture meant to be felt with your fingertips. The ink embedded in the paper also gives texture to the image itself. For these reasons, handmade photogravures seemed the perfect medium for a series which, at its essence, explores the beauty of surface textures: human skin and its freckles and scars, like a thin veil of stars.

Prints are approximately 8x6, on 11x14 Rives BFK, with a chin colle of Japanese Kitikata paper. Examples can be seen here and here.

Fritz Liedtke Books
Available from photo-eye

Featured in:

Astra Velum. Fritz Liedtke. Fritz Liedtke Fine Arts, Portland, OR, 2012 (photo-eye Cat# ZF223)

Diffusion. Blue Mitchell. OneTwelve, Portland, 2012 (photo-eye Cat# I1020)

Astra Velum. Fritz Liedtke. Fritz Liedtke Fine Arts, Portland, OR, 2011 (photo-eye Cat# ZE560)

Lenswork Magazine. Lenswork Publishing, 2006 (photo-eye Cat# LQ037)