Howard Harris
United States
American-born photographer Howard Harris, in his carefully altered digital prints, takes on what is perhaps the most American of themes: the interrelationship of perception and technology. Harris explores how the whole emotional complex underlying one's personality integrates into the structural logic of architecture and design. As Harris himself frames it, "my aim to combine technology and aesthetics in a way that expands the viewer's experience of photographic art. Because, visual reality is an ever-shifting, highly individualized experience. In any given moment, what we see reflects both our inner state and a synthesis of outer qualities—light, color, movement, space. My exploration in dimensional photographic art represents an attempt to recreate the perceptual experience, with its dynamic nature and hidden complexities. In my patented process I use photographic constructions, a single often abstracted image is layered over itself on clear acrylic surfaces and superimposed on a subtle grid. The resulting visual phenomenon infuses the image with a sense of dimensionality and fluidity affected by such changes as the angle of viewing and light. However, perceptual mechanics are only part of the equation. Equally essential are universal principles of design that produce qualities we perceive as beauty.
Power
1. What’s your background?
Howard Harris has long been fascinated by both visual perception and design. The Denver Colorado USA native earned a BFA from Kansas City Art Institute, MID (Masters Industrial Design) from Pratt Institute in New York studying with internationally renowned design theorist Rowena Reed Kostellow. Harris has spent more than 35 years combining design and technology where he has won many prestigious professional awards. Now his creative energy has turned to his lifelong passion, photography. With an iconoclastic streak that had seen him consistently forging new directions in design, he was bound to approach the photographic image in an unconventional way as well. In 2017 Harris was granted a United States Patent no: 9,753,295 titled Apparatus and Method of Manufacturer for a Layered Artwork proving the uniqueness and inventiveness of his photographic work. Since then his work has appeared in many books and publications such as ARTtour International Artists of the Decade, Art Collectors Choice Japan, International Contemporary Masters, and Top 10 Contemporary Artists, to mention a few. He has also been awarded Artists for a Green Planet Artist of the Decade, International Prize Raffaello, International Prize Giulio Cesare, International Prize Leonardo Da Vinci, International Prize Caravaggio and more. He serves as a Trustee of The Kansas City Art Institute has won the Who’s Who Worldwide Lifetime Achievement and the USA Small Businessperson of the Year. His work is shown internationally and represented by galleries in the United States and Europe.
2. What does your work aim to say?
Visual reality is an ever-shifting, highly individualized experience. In any given moment, what we see reflects both our inner state and a synthesis of outer qualities—light, color, movement, space. My exploration in dimensional photographic art represents an attempt to recreate the perceptual experience, with its dynamic nature and hidden complexities.
Josef Albers once said that “Abstraction is real, probably more real than nature”. I believe that Photographic Art should go beyond a static two-dimensional representation of nature. A photo should capture more than one moment in time, one view and one experience. Adding additional dimension to a two-dimensional image should be the goal of the artist. As an artist one should master technology. But mastering technology or technique only makes one a technician. The artist must transcend the merely technical. It’s the goal of the artist to add the intangible dimensions of personal expression, emotion, movement and the opportunity for the image to interact with its ever-changing environment.
3. How does your work comment on current social or political issues?
Some of my images may be defined by others as commenting on social and or political issues because they overlay their own emotional/intellectual/visual experiences. But, I don’t believe my work deliberately or by design comments on social or political issues.
4. Who are your biggest influences?
That is a hard question to answer since I am inspired by so many in the arts world. Here are a few in the visual arts that I admire and am inspired by: Rowena Reed Kostellow, Julian Stanczak, Moholy-Nagy, Bridget Riley, Josef Albers, Frank Stella, Ellsworth Kelly, Victor Vasarely, Yacov Agam, Wassily Kandinsky, Jackson Pollock, Franz Kline, Clyfford Still, Pablo Picasso, Paul Cézanne, Marcel Duchamp, Henry Moore, Alberto Giacometti and Constantin Brancusi. I thought I would stop here with the arts world. From the Photographic world (understanding many do and have done more than photography) I admire Ansel Adams, Richard Avedon, Annie Leibovitz, Diane Arbus, Edward Weston, Salvador Dali and Andy Warhol. From the Architectural/Design world (yes, most did more than just architecture) Frank Lloyd Wright, Frank Gehry, Le Corbusier, Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, Eero Saarinen, I.M. Pei, Walter Gropius, Marcel Breuer, and Ray Eames. I could go on and on naming sculptors, philosophers, and physicists but, I think you get the wide variety of people that have influenced my vision, aesthetics and technology. The short version of who I admire is just about all people who work in multiple arts/multi-disciplinary techniques and push the edges of perception.
Hospitality
5. How has your art evolved over the years?
My artwork progressed through several stages throughout my adventure as an artist.
• The first stages of my work were mostly technology based, using the camera, with what one would consider a good eye. Meaning I did what I did somewhat unconsciously. The “art” or image just happened because I understood technology and was lucky with subject, composition, etc.
• The second stage of my work began in the early 70’s at the Kansas City Art Institute. It was there I began to understand that mastering technology was just part of the “art” equation. Going through their foundation program helped me realize that intuition and a good eye were great but without the discipline of deliberateness all my art would continue to be either lucky or random. It was there that I became a deliberate artist, able to control my actions and images.
• The third stage also happened at the Kansas City Art Institute where I used my art to become a designer. The quest to create for others overpowered my desire to create for myself. My technological skills improved not only with the mechanics of creating images through tools but the mechanics of my mind and thought also improved.
• The fourth stage of my art happened when I went to Pratt Institute to study under Rowena Reed Kostellow. By this time, I was clearly on the design track, not the fine art track, and wanted to learn Industrial Design from one of the founders of that profession. It was Rowena that helped me discover that the understanding of technology of machine and thought were not enough. One also needs the understanding of self, vision, emotion and surprise to create either good design or good art. There need not be a difference between design and art. Yes, they can exist separately but when they come together it is “nirvana”.
• The fifth stage really lasted from the early 70’s through 2011. I became part of a 5-person company, grew it to over 160 people based on the concept of merging technology with design with the end goal to make it art. Honestly, 95% of what we created I would classify as design. The 5% that could be considered art helped the entire company keep going with the knowledge that art was possible in a very commercial setting.
• The sixth stage of my quest to create art is where I am at right now. I have come to the realization that till now I have been a designer not an artist.
6. What does art mean to you?
Recently, I have come to the realization that for most of my professional career I have been a designer not an artist. I define design as that which one does for others. Pleasing them, working for them, having them set the parameters for success and passing the final judgement as to what is successful or not. Now, I am striving to create Art for myself. I am the one I must please. I am the one that sets the parameters and I am the one that judges what is successful or not. Since I am still trying to understand this phase of my career, I can’t explain it much more than I have. But, also understand I am still somewhat in the struggle between “Art” and “Design” and striving to create more dimensional and impactful photography.
7. What’s the most valuable piece of art to you?
My most valuable pieces of art were my “breakthrough firsts”. The first piece was a poster I created for a 1970 art exhibition called Eye-Sight. This is the first published work where I pushed color and form to their abstract limits without losing the photographic basis for theme. My second favorite/standout came a few years later when I had a gallery show in Kansas City and New York that featured what I called “Popsicle People”. These images where three-dimensional, life size constructions of people playing in an environment where the people were photographed from the top, bottom, and all sides. The flat images were then laminated to a full-size structure. The third and most current favorite/standout is an image called “Room with a View”. This was the first time I combined my new technology with an image to create, with two dimensional prints, the color, depth, and movement I imagine. This work became the basis for creating a US Patent.
8. What’s next for you in the future?
I will continue my quest to create dimensional photographic images with a deeper understanding of what Arshile Gorky once said about abstractions, “Abstraction allows man to see with his mind what he cannot see physically with his eyes.... Abstract art enables the artist to perceive beyond the tangible, to extract the infinite out of the finite. It is the emancipation of the mind. It is an exploration into unknown areas.” I will continue my quest into the unknown with the belief that whatever I strive to create will be aesthetically pleasing, and forever changing.
Petterns
