Bob Benson
"My photographic perspective is, mainly, simple is better. Simple backgrounds, foregrounds, or even non-existent."
My photography presents uncomplicated art images. I strive to give viewers a lens into a scene that they can relate to, can imagine themselves there, and that simplifies the scene for them into its most straightforward essence.
Recently I have emphasized simplicity, spareness, in my images. This often means little or no foregrounds and minimal backgrounds; this also means little breadth on either side. I work for a focus on the image object, often coming to a minimalist result. Even in landscape and urban settings I work towards these goals.
Mostly, in my history, I have been a print film guy. Beginning with black-and-white nearly 70 years ago I often work with low-contrast rather than high-contrast images. When film was the only available color medium, I chose to work in color print because, in my view, the effect of transparency film was to over-emphasize intensity and contrast in color rather than a portrayal of simple uncomplicated images. Today in the digital age I continue to do some work in print film, but also now I work mostly in relatively low-intensity digital images. I do some digital image processing to adjust perspective and sharpening and the color saturation adjustment when necessary … and most recently, software filters that give an oil painting look to the image. I prefer to display black/white and color in large images, mostly 30x30 and larger square prints which emphasize the “spareness” and simplicity noted above.
Bob
Benson
BOB BENSON - The Collections
"Spare N Square" - 'spare' to reduce foreground and background, 'square' to reduce complexity from the right and left of the image.
"Simplicity" - the image stripped to a simple, even minimalist, perspective.
"Landscapes" - the land in living color.