Bio
Jeff Foster is a lifelong resident of Long Island. Passionate about photography for over twenty years, he began at a time when he was working in software engineering management, and was seeking a creative counterpoint to the responsibilities of his profession.
With early photographic instruction at the Ansel Adams Gallery in Yosemite National Park, from notable instructors including Philip Hyde (pioneer Sierra Club Book contributor), John Sexton (renowned black and white photographer, Photographic Assistant and Technical Consultant to Ansel Adams, and Consultant to Eastman Kodak), Christopher Burkett (acclaimed color photographer and master Cibachrome printer), and Joan Myers (the 2003 Eliot Porter Prize winner), Jeff has been enjoying the pursuit of photography ever since.
Artist Statement
I took up photography as a recreational escape from my software engineering career. I thought that learning – playing with – photography in the pursuit of creating artistic compositions was about as far away from developing computer software as I could get.
My subject matter has always converged towards the natural landscape. In 1989 I attended a weeklong photography workshop at the Ansel Adams Gallery in Yosemite National Park and learned a great deal.
The most influential aspect of this workshop was time spent with Philip Hyde (one of the early Sierra Club book photographers). We reviewed my work and together discussed his approach to photographic composition and nature photography, and that experience remains a major influence in my work.
Through the years the distinction between photography and computers has blurred. Digital sensors now provide many of the capabilities of film; the chemical darkroom has given way to graphics software and fine art printers. The transition of photographic technology into the digital domain has resulted in an eminently familiar environment in which to pursue the creation of artistic composition.
Although many of the tools have changed in the past twenty-five years, I continue to pursue the same esthetic in my work. This work hopefully invokes a favorable emotional response to the imagery, and ultimately the reality, of an un-crowded natural world, worthy of increased public affection.
- Jeff Foster
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