PRESS: LANDSCAPE ABSTRACTS

RL•S Gallery, SC, Features Works by John Duckworth
Landscape Abstracts: Photographs by John Duckworth
A limited edition series.
Show From 6 - 9pm on August 18, 2005

CHARLESTON -- John Duckworth, the passionate creator of the Landscape Abstract series, will commemorate his two year adventure into the boundaries of photography, with a show at Robert Lange Studios, Thursday August 18. This limited edition series blends John's passion for painting, photography and the serenity of the low country. Walking the line between realism and abstraction, these images represent the essence of landscape - distilled into serene interplays of color and tone.

Landscape Abstracts: Photographs by John Duckworth is a special portfolio of eighty-six images, representing common threads of our surroundings—the ripples or calm of water, the clouds and light on the horizon, and the impermanence of nature—through two years of photographic art by John Duckworth. Each of the images, available in three sizes, is printed by the photographer and is signed, titled, and numbered in a limited edition of 10.

John Duckworth's artwork is characterized by an intense love of movement, color theory and a fascination with the "captured moment." His most recent body and the subject of his upcoming show at Robert Lange Studios, may be his most successful work to date, having been featured at Kiawah's Sanctuary, FIG Restaurant, and the acclaimed Art Moves Jazz event.

As a professional photographer and graphic designer, he incorporates "commercial" skills into his artwork, "The camera and the computer are simply modern tools of the trade," says Duckworth. "I use them just as early painters used the camera obscura and camera lucida - as tools for initial sketches."

John is interested in color relationships, abstraction, realism, deconstruction, the photographic image, design, and communication and hi work reflects an appreciation of the natural beauty of landscape, cityscapes and human interaction within these environments.

This diversity of interests and styles isn't surprising, considering the long list of artists who acted as both mentors and teacher. Having worked under David Baze in San Diego for several years as a teenager, he then studied with Wayne Thiebaud at U.C. Davis, with ceramic artist Les Lawrence at Grossmont College and later earned his BA in Studio Art studying under Cliff Peacock, Michael Tyzack and Michelle Van Parys at the College of Charleston.

John Duckworth is currently working as an artist in two industries - as part owner and art director of a communications agency in Charleston and as a painter and photographer. Over the past five years, his paintings and photographs have been sold to collectors in New York, Charlotte, Los Angeles, Seattle, Atlanta, Charleston, and Canada.

"My art making is a continual process of reinvention, which parallels my own personal development. I begin with carefully planned ideas and concepts, but only when I no longer know what I am doing do good things happen," said John. "At its best it is an open-ended conversation."

Each Abstraction creates a dialogue about nature's continual growth and captures a fleeting moment. The photos in this commemorative series can be viewed at Robert Lange Studios, Fine Art Gallery at 151 East Bay Street, in downtown Charleston.