Chris Dahlquist

My current artwork is a culmination of over thirty years with a camera in my hands and an earnest study of photographic history. These pieces in the Mile Marker Series are comprised of sheets of dark brown steel, painted with many layers of gold paint, providing a textured and luminous underpainting for my photograph. I then print the image on top of this painted surface, allowing the gold to shine through. The result is an image that is ever-changing, both with the lighting because of the luminosity and with the viewing angle because of the texture. Photographically my images are about space and light and are not meant to be about a specific location, but to recall a sense or memory of place. They are metaphors for space in-between where things are subtly beautiful, a visual respite in a saturated world. Because of my desire to continuously explore new images and to create only original artwork, each piece I create is singular; the material, handwork, and photograph combine to form a unique object, one that lives outside the world of reproduction. Additionally, I print each photograph only once per size, which means I have a constantly changing gallery of works available.