Doug Prince
American, born 1943
Doug Prince belongs to a generation that has sought to expand the boundaries of the photographic medium through both conceptual and iconographic means. Inspired by 19th century ambrotypes, Victorian Easter eggs with peepholes, and miniature dioramas (all of which are small, hand-held objects which invite viewer participation). Prince began experimenting with 3-dimensional imagery while still in graduate school. He developed the idea of using photographic images on transparencies, placing one behind the other, and containing the images within the closed environment of a small plexiglas box. His further explorations into illusionistic fantasy continued at the University of Florida where he served as Assistant Professor of Photography. Additional influences can be traced to symbolist and surrealist painters, and to the photographer Jerry N. Uelsmann, a colleague at the University of Florida. A major group show, Photography into Sculpture, curated by Peter Bunnell, was mounted at the Museum of Modern Art in New York in 1970, and Prince's work in that show shared with others an exploitation of the technology of plastics and a concern with the photograph as a tactile object. His work was included in numerous other group shows in the early 70s focusing on transparent images, ``Small Environments'' or ``Extraordinary Realities.''
Prince's concern has been with examining the graphic qualities inherent in the materials as a means of translating light and space relationships into topographic images. He builds up new tonal relationships not possible with images printed on paper and viewed with refracted light. He has consistently explored the qualities of graphic arts film with its properties of high contrast and potential for solarization of the image.
A number of diverse elements coalesce in Prince's work to make it dynamic and vital. The inherent veracity of the photographic image lends authenticity to the subject represented, and an intriguing tension results from the play between illusion and reality. The fusion and juxtaposition of diverse and unrelated images brings about a new illusionistic reality, creating Prince's own personal symbology. The fabrication of a photographic fantasy--in his words, ``through the synthesis of unconnected images into new spatial and psychological relationships''--has been an on-going concern with him in both his photographic prints and in his boxes. His search for new personal symbols is both intuitive and empirical, and has become the crux of his image-making. Prince associates this ``restructuring of reality'' with dream imagery where ``elements converge in new relationships to offer fresh insights and create personal symbols which further our understanding of ourselves and our environment.'' He works with restructuring the elements of light, time and space and explores the natural order of things (birth, death, evolution and entropy). The content of his boxes ``range from realistic environments, composed of objects in logical spaces, to the more problematic and surreal juxtaposition of elements akin to surrealistic imagery.'' His primary thematic concerns are the ``sensory exploration of the environment by his two sons, the containment and vulnerability of domestic animals in the landscape, and evidence of humanity on the natural environment.'' Prince's union of structural and stylistic concerns, firmly entrenched in a photographic vision, make his work an important contribution to the language of photography.
His body portraits began on a serious level in 1993 and involve a photo resist technique. He first oils a body part, like an arm, then he impresses it onto photo paper. When the paper is dipped into photographic chemicals, the oil creates an area that resists development.
"Doug(las) (Donald) Prince." Contemporary Photographers. Gale, 1996. Gale Biography In Context. Web. 15 Feb. 2012.
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