Alan Johnston

Alan Johnston is without peer when it comes to the eye, used to appreciate the presence of majestic delicacy. Alan exhibits how the factor of aperture is for letting the Divine in. The rest is in when the shutter is, by the call of response, moved to capture form. 

Autobiography 

I have been taking photographs in some manner since I was aged 14, so 60 years. 

 

In the early 1990s I acquired more ‘professional’ equipment, staying with analogue film photography until 2005 involving the whole gamut of shooting, developing, enlarging and printing in 35mm, medium and large formats. 

 

In 2004 I decided to go digital and to aid this I returned to tertiary study and completed all the practical components of a degree in Photojournalism at QCA in Brisbane (Queensland College of Art).

 

Beyond the technical is an ‘artistic’ impulse to ‘capture’ the Divine in the visual as an energetic communication. This could be described as a paring down or a ‘less is more’ aesthetic. It is obvious when one is really present with 'what is there to be with' that any surface representation is just the beginning. 

 

It could be left there, and all sorts of manipulation can be employed to enhance any lack but the possibility exists to bring a multi-dimensionality to photography and so point the way to a greater truth than simple existence. Something often hinted at in the spontaneity of ’street’ photography, the ‘immediacy' of nature images or the ephemeral and fluid changes we see in light, mist, smoke, flowing water….

 

With love, Alan J