TIMOTHY DUFFY – BLUE MUSE
2019-07-15For the past several years, Timothy Duffy (American, born 1963) has created one-of-a-kind direct positive tintype portraits of American musicians. Despite the importance of these musicians and the national legacy they represent, most remain little known. Duffy’s masterful photographs, shot with a large camera, big enough to hold the plates you see in this gallery, celebrate these important creators, custodians, purveyors, and performers of American music. The process he uses, the tintype, an American innovation, dates back to the nineteenth century. It requires coating a metal plate with a wet, syrupy solution that holds light-sensitive chemicals. The plate must then be placed immediately in the camera and exposed to the subject before it dries completely. Much like the improvisational qualities of the music that his subjects play, the best tintypes often result from incidental effects of the process-drying too quickly, oversensitivity, slight ripples in the surface of the emulsion.
Opposite – Pat Cohen, Bourbon Street Queen, Hillsboro, NC, 2015
Exhibition runs through to July 28th, 2019
NOMA – New Orleans Museum of Art
1 Collins C. Diboll Circle
New Orleans
70124 LA
