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Portrait of an artist
Artist David Dye’s Farm Portrait is a digital photograph enhanced with computer software. |
By BRANDY STARK
© St. Petersburg Times
published January 10, 2002
An art professor's body of work offers a peek into his own life through photography and ceramics.
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TAMPA -- David Dye never leaves home without a camera in hand. "After all," he says, "you never know when you might see a great picture."
The artist's passion for photography first emerged in the 1960s when an art instructor advised him to make slides to document his work. Using a 35mm camera, Dye snapped photos of his found object and mixed media sculptures. He always had a little film left at the end of each roll, which he used to capture images of friends and events around him.
Now, Dye, 59, uses a Canon digital camera that fits in the palm of his hand. That camera is responsible for some of the nearly 100 works featured in his current show, "Artworks by David Dye," at the Hillsborough Community College Ybor Campus Art Gallery. Also on display are many of the pottery and porcelain wares he has created during his 30-year tenure as an associate professor at the campus, where he teaches art appreciation and ceramics.
Self portrait by David Dye
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The show is a retrospective of a lifetime of creations, giving snapshot glimpses into the life of the artist. Images feature posed artistic nudes, animals on his family farm in Dover, local landscapes, self-portraits and pictures of his students, his artworks and his family. Some works are scanned from Dye's older, disintegrating slides. Others are digital images enhanced through Photoshop software.
Farm Portrait is a mixture of serenity and mystery. Created by Dye and his wife, Katlyn Vazquez-Vila, it shows the artist kneeling in a field, playing with his two dogs. A herd of cattle walks around him, the bull pausing to watch the man with interest. In the distance, cars pass on a long, lonely stretch of highway.
A large luminous circle, created by a natural mist and cloud formation, hangs in the sky. The sphere's colors have been digitally augmented to show the pink and orange hues reflected from the setting sun. The overall effect transforms the sky from familiar to unknown.
The self-portrait Ybor Shop Window is an enhanced photo of a storefront, filled with iridescent objects that seem to glow with tangible heat. Amid the items is a spectral man, Dye himself, camera held at chest level. He gazes almost impassively at his audience, with a sense of cool self-confidence.
Dye's affection for clay is also evident in the show, which features items he displays and uses in his home and studio. What he calls a "joke container" illustrates his sense of humor. In an oblong canister of clay glazed in earthy tans and browns, the artist carves the impression of a lid. However, the lid is uncut and cannot be removed from the body of the work. Along its top, Dye writes "Do not open."
REVIEW
Artworks by David Dye, Hillsborough Community College Ybor Campus Art Gallery, Room 101, Performing Arts Building, Palm Avenue and 15th Street, Tampa. Through Jan. 31. Free admission. Gallery hours: 9 a.m.-4 p.m. Mon., Wed.-Fri., noon-8 p.m. Tues. Call (813) 253-7674. Gallery talk and reception with the artist is 5-8 p.m. Tuesday in the gallery. Free.
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