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2019 2018 VIDEO PUBLICATIONS AWARDS |
About his Work
Because of the media Stewart uses, video and photography, he believes that all physical locations possess a peculiar frequency signature. This would suggest that each venue is energetically different from another and therefore requires a new approach when looking for an image. Consequently, it is the location which determines the technique to use when creating the image. Stewart believes the artist simply permits himself to be a vehicle for portraying the impressions perceived. Inspiration in his view is 10% an abstract intuition and 90% working incessantly on that vague notion hoping it develops into something of beauty. To summarize Stewart's approach to art in one sentence : Creating Art is allowing yourself to be used for a higher ideal, and the higher ideal is aesthetics.
Karl F. Stewart was born in the States in 1950. After military service in the Navy on a nuclear ballistic missile submarine, he studied existential phenomenology in psychology and philosophy at Duquesne University, In January 1974 he became an early member of the Pittsburgh Filmmakers Association during its founding when it started out in a basement in East Liberty, Pittsburgh. There Stewart followed a three-month 2.5-hour-a-week class in photography. Six months later after an interview with Bill Strickland at the Manchester Craftsmen's Guild, he was awarded a National Endowment for the Arts Artist-in-Residence photography grant for two years to work in an inner-city community arts program. As part of the program he also worked as a photographer for the Carnegie Museum of Art and Assistant Director for the Manchester Bidwell Photographic Training Center. When the residency ended Stewart taught photographic design at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh. It was during these first years of photography that he freelanced for Associated Press, Pittsburgh bureau. Back at University again, he studied journalism and Latin American Studies at Ohio University, after which he worked as a photojournalist, journalist, assistant editor for small newspapers in Ohio, Virginia and W. Virginia. Seeking an experience abroad, in the early 1980s Stewart left the States and moved to Italy where he taught English. In 1986 he became a Professor of English at the Università degli Studi di Torino, and later also a Professor at the Università del Piemonte Orientale, Novara and Director of the language program at Scuola Università di Management d'Impresa, Pinerolo, Italy. During a 15-year period he taught business language communication courses to CEOs and top management in major corporations in Turin. He wrote a number of books for the study of English developing the notions of The Mathematics of Tense Construction and Eggshell Time. Though not having taken even one photograph for 27 years, Stewart was encouraged to start doing photography again in 2008. In 2009 he resigned from University and moved to San Francisco, California (2009-12). He lated did photography and video out of Dusseldorf, Germany (2012-16). Presently he is working out of France. In 2019 Stewart became a member of the French La Maison des artistes. He has been, and still is, living in France and Italy for more than 30 years. He speaks English, French and Italian.
Regarding the term Technique, Stewart would probably have to start off saying the two styles dominating the genre of his work are Documentary and Impressionism. In fact everything he does is oriented around these two hashtags.
Another characteristics of his images is the vibrancy of the colors he uses which is a constant throughout the various series he develops.
Specifically related to photography, technically his images are museum quality archival prints. This implies his images are printed on high quality archival acid free paper using the latest technology in printing, Digigraphie, which is also referred to as pigment archival ink printing.
Lumière . Lumen . Lux
Book released 1 June 2019
120 pages, 52 images, 1 page of text in four languages (English, French, German, Italian)
price 25€ / 35€ signed and numbered (plus shipping costs)