DAVID ELLINGSEN PHOTOGRAPHY

Recently I’ve been very interested in Found Photography…especially as it relates to the art, craft and evolution of the portrait.

There’s something about finding a portrait from 1869 in a shoe box at the back of a thrift store that really gets my mind going. Initially, just the fact that it has survived 140 years to end up in my hand seems important enough. The craftsmanship that this implies always impresses me and sometimes makes me consider our current popular archival printing techniques, not to mention all the photographs I now store on my computer and where they shall end up.

Often small clues present themselves around the edge of the image or on the reverse…date, studio, city, cryptic hand-writing…but the content of the photograph itself remains the only context available to the viewer. It feels such a pure expression of photography.

I found this series of photographs all together in Winnipeg,  as if someone had sorted them already.
I suppose being one of four brothers gave me an immediate affinity for them…

Photo credit: Shaver, Chelsea, MI