David Stephenson (born 1955) is an American-Australian
fine art photographer known for his representations of the
sublime.[1] His photographic subjects have included landscapes from America to Australia, the Arctic and Antarctica, the Southern Ocean, European sacred architecture, and day- and nighttime skyscapes. He has lived in
Tasmania since 1982.[2]
Early life and education
David Stephenson was born in 1955 in Washington, D.C., the third child of two scientists, Elizabeth W. and John L. Stephenson.[2] While attending public schools in suburban Maryland, he took Saturday classes at the
Corcoran School of the Arts and Design under artists including
Juan Downey. Drawn to nature and the environment from an early age, he was inspired by the writings and environmental advocacy of
John Muir.[2] His love of the mountains drew him to Colorado, where he began undergraduate studies in the sciences and humanities at the
University of Colorado Boulder in 1973. Classes with Gary Metz stimulated his growing interest in photography, and he completed a BFA in studio art and a BA in art history in 1979.[2] In Colorado he also met
Robert Adams, who lived in nearby Longmont and was an early mentor.[2] He moved to Albuquerque in 1979 to start graduate studies at the
University of New Mexico, working under
Thomas Barrow,
Beaumont Newhall, and
Van Deren Coke.[2] Photographing across the American Southwest and California from 1979 to 1981 with a
large format camera, and inspired by artistic precedents from
Carleton Watkins to
Robert Smithson, he produced his first major body of work, New Monuments, which focussed on industrial structures in the landscape.[3] After completing a Master of Arts in 1980, he was awarded a
National Endowment for the Arts grant, which allowed him to travel to
Alaska in 1981 to photograph the newly completed
Trans-Alaska Pipeline. Responding to the Pipeline’s linearity and influenced by 19th century photographers such as
Watkins, he first worked with
panoramic composites in Alaska, a pictorial strategy he would return to periodically for subsequent series. Stephenson completed a Master of Fine Arts at the University of New Mexico in 1982 with an exhibition of the Alaskan panoramas, and a dissertation on the 19th century photographers of the transcontinental railroad.[2] In 2001, he was awarded a PhD in Fine Arts from the
University of Tasmania.
Work
Stephenson moved to Australia in 1982 to take up a junior teaching position at the
University of Tasmania School of Art, at the encouragement of
Thomas Joshua Cooper, who had been teaching a summer school there. Agreeing to stay only for two years, in 1984 he was made a tenured faculty member and led the photography program at the school, along with later positions as postgraduate coordinator and research coordinator, until his retirement from teaching in 2013.[2]
Stephenson has worked on many long-term overlapping projects in his pursuit of the photographic representation of the
sublime in time and space,[1] using a variety of
medium format and
large format cameras and film types, and more recently digital photography. An exploration of the relationship of photography to time has been a recurrent theme in his work, both through the use of long exposures, and the compositing of sequential exposures. His photographic series include New Monuments (1979-81),[3]Composite Landscapes (1982-88),[4]Clouds (1990-93),[5]Vast (1990-91), The Ice (1991-92),[6]Domes (1993-2005),[3] Vaults (2003-09),[7]Star Drawings (1995-2009),[8]Drowned (2001-02),[9][10] Marking Time (2003-05),[11][12]Light Cities (2005-13),[9]Time Slice (2014-22),[13] and Survivors (2019-22).[14]
Publications
Stars / photographs by David Stephenson; essay by Keith F. Davis, Julie Saul Gallery, New York, 1999.
Skeletons / photographs by David Stephenson; essay by Greg French, Space and Light, Fern Tree, 2003. ISBN 0975039504
Visions of Heaven: The Dome in European Architecture, Princeton Architectural Press, New York, 2005. ISBN 1-56898-549-5
Heavenly Vaults: From Romanesque to Gothic in European Architecture, Princeton Architectural Press, New York, 2009. ISBN 978-1-56898-840-5
Exhibitions
David Stephenson’s photographs have been presented in hundreds of group exhibitions and over sixty solo exhibitions including:
1983: Australian Perspecta 1983, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney
1988: Australian Photography: the 1980's, Australian National Gallery, Canberra[15]
1992: Location, Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Melbourne[16]
1993: David Stephenson:The Ice, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney and Australian Centre for Contemporary Art, Melbourne[17]
1994: Landed: Landscape Art in Australia, 1960-90, Australian National Gallery, Canberra
1994: An American Century of Photography: From Dry-Plate to Digital, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, and international tour
1998: Sublime Space: David Stephenson Photographs 1989-98, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne[18]
1999: Tempus Fugit/Time Flies, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City[19]
2001: Space + Light: David Stephenson Photographs, 1982-1996, Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, Hobart
2001: Starlight: David Stephenson Photographs, Cleveland Museum of Art[20]
2002: Fieldwork: Australian Art 1968-2002, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne[6]
2006: Symétries sublimes, photographies de David Stephenson, Centre Culturel Calouste Gulbenkian, Paris[21]
2007: Cross Currents: Focus on Contemporary Australian Art, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney[22]
2010: In the Balance, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney[23]
2011: Transcendence: Photographs by David Stephenson, Monash Gallery of Art, Melbourne[24]
2011: Luminous World – Contemporary Art from the Wesfarmers Collection, Art Gallery of Western Australia, Perth[25]
2013: Australia: land and landscape, Royal Academy of Arts, London; organised with National Gallery of Art, Canberra[4]
2014 Perduti nel paesaggio/Lost in Landscape, Museo di Arte Moderna e Contemporanea di Trento e Rovereto, Italy[26]
2015: The Photograph and Australia, Art Gallery of Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney[27]
2017: David Stephenson: Human Landscapes, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney[28]
2018: Noorderlicht International Photofestival IN VIVO | the nature of nature, Museum Belvédère, Heerenveen, The Netherlands[29]
2019: Civilization: The Way We Live Now, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne[30]
Collections
Stephenson’s photographs are held in many public collections, including:
^
abHallmark Photographic Collection (1999). An American century of photography: From dry-plate to digital: The Hallmark Photographic Collection. Keith F. Davis (2nd ed., rev. and enl ed.). Kansas City, Mo.: Hallmark Cards Inc., in association with Harry N. Abrams.
ISBN978-0-8109-6378-8.
^
abcStephenson, David (2005). Visions of heaven: The dome in European architecture. Victoria Hammond, Keith F. Davis. New York: Princeton Architectural Press.
ISBN1-56898-549-5.
^
abThomas Keneally; Royal Academy of Arts (2013). Australia. London.
ISBN978-1-907533-45-7.{{
cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (
link)
^Hallmark Photographic Collection (1995). An American century of photography: From dry-plate to digital. Keith F. Davis, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art. New York: Hallmark Cards, Inc. in association with H.N. Abrams.
ISBN0-8109-1964-8.
^
abJason Smith; Charles Green; National Gallery of Victoria (2002). Fieldwork: Australian art 1968-2002. Melbourne, Vic.: National Gallery of Victoria.
ISBN0-7241-0213-2.
^Stephenson, David (2009). Heavenly vaults: From Romanesque to Gothic in European architecture. New York: Princeton Architectural Press.
ISBN978-1-56898-840-5.
^Annear, Judy (2015). The photograph and Australia. Geoffrey Batchen, Daniel Palmer, Michael Aird, Jane Lydon, Kathleen Davidson, Martyn Jolly. Sydney, N.S.W.
ISBN978-1-74174-116-2.{{
cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (
link)
^
abMiles, Melissa (2015). The language of light and dark: Light and place in Australian photography. Montreal.
ISBN978-0-7735-4550-2.{{
cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (
link)
^Rachel Kent; Museum of Contemporary Art (2010). In the balance: Art for a changing world. Sydney, N.S.W.: Museum of Contemporary Art.
ISBN978-1-921034-45-9.
Lynne Andrews: Antarctic eye : the visual journey, Mount Rumney, 2007. ISBN 9780646478395
Judy Annear: The Photograph and Australia, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, 2015. ISBN 9781741741162
Jorge Calado: A Prova de Agua/Waterproof, Edition Stemmle, Zurich, 1998. ISBN 9789728495053
Jorge Calado: David Stephenson: Symetries Sublime/Sublime Symmetries, Centre Culturel Calouste Gulbenkian, Paris, 2006. ISBN 972-8462-44-1
Jorge Calado: Ingenuidades: Fotografia e Engenharia 1846-2006, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, Lisbon, 2006. ISBN 9789723111750
Peter Conrad: At home in Australia, National Gallery of Australia and Thames & Hudson, Canberra, 2003. ISBN 978-0500511411
Isobel Crombie: "Foreword" in David Stephenson: Heavenly Vaults: From Romanesque to Gothic in European Architecture, Princeton Architectural Press, New York, 2009. ISBN 978-1-56898-840-5
Keith F. Davis: An American Century of Photography: From Dry-Plate to Digital, Hallmark, Kansas City, 1994. ISBN 9780810919648
Keith F. Davis: An American Century of Photography: From Dry Plate to Digital (2nd Edition, Revised and Enlarged), Abrams, New York, 1998. ISBN 0-8109-6378-7
Keith F. Davis: "Admiration and awe - David Stephenson and the photographic sublime", in David Stephenson: Visions of Heaven: The Dome in European Architecture, Princeton Architectural Press, New York, 2005. ISBN 1-56898-549-5
Helen Ennis: Australian Photography: The 1980's, Australian National Gallery, Canberra, and Melbourne Oxford University Press, Oxford, Auckland, New York, 1988 ISBN 9780642081599
Helen Ennis: Photography and Australia, Reaktion, London, 2007. ISBN 9781861893239
Roslynn D. Haynes: Tasmanian Visions: Landscapes in Writing, Art, and Photography, Polymath Press, Tasmania, 2006. ISBN 097757380X
Isabel Hesketh: “David Stephenson”, in Rachel Kent: In the Balance: Art for a Changing World, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, 2010. ISBN 9781921034459
Melissa Miles: The Language of Light and Dark – Light and Place in Australian Photography, McGill-Queen's University Press, Montreal & Kingston and Power Publications, Sydney, 2015. ISBN 978-0-7735-4550-2
Daniel Palmer: “David Stephenson”, chapter in John Stringer: Cross Currents: Focus on Contemporary Australian Art, Museum of Contemporary Art, Sydney, 2007. ISBN 9781921034206
Daniel Palmer: “David Stephenson”, chapter in Blair French and Daniel Palmer: Twelve Australian Photo-Artists, Piper Press, Sydney, 2009. ISBN 9780975190173
Jan Schall, editor: Tempus Fugit: Time Flies, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, and University of Washington, Seattle, 2001. ISBN 9780942614329
David Stephenson: "Marks in the landscape: Notes 1979-1991", in Jerry de Gryse and Andrew Sant, ed: Our Common Ground, a celebration of art, place & environment, Australian Institute of Landscape Architects and University of Tasmania, Hobart, 1994. ISBN 0 909947 05 8
Susan Van Wyk: Sublime Space: David Stephenson Photographs, 1989-98, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, 1998.
Susan Van Wyk: “David Stephenson - The Ice”, in Charles Green and Jason Smith: Fieldwork: Australian Art 1968-2002, National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne, 2002. ISBN 0 7241 0213 2