SSH Gallery Features Photographer Kurt Norlin

Kurt Norlin - "Voodoo"

Albany photographer Kurt Norlin will be exhibiting a series of recent black-and-white photographs from Feb. 11 to March 22 in the South Santiam Gallery at Linn-Benton Community College, 6500 Pacific Blvd. SW, Albany.

In “Alternate Vision,” Norlin shares his close observations of his immediate surroundings, usually gleaned from long walks through neighborhoods, down back alleys and along riverfront paths. His photographs, made in the “toy camera” aesthetic, become a series of visual bookmarks for the often-overlooked glimpses hidden all around us.

“Over the years I have become more and more interested in the essence of a place, rather than the pure descriptive fact,” Norlin says. “To that end, I started shooting with toy and pinhole cameras in the early 1990s in order to capture that essence.”

For his recent work, Norlin has turned to digital cameras with plastic optics to create the softly focused, dreamlike quality characteristic of his work.

Norlin has lived in Albany and Corvallis since the 1970s, and has been photographing for nearly half a century. He holds a BFA from Central Washington University and an MFA in photography from the University of Oregon.

His work has been exhibited around the Northwest, most recently at the Oregon Artist’s Showcase in Newberg, PhotoWorks NW in Roseburg, and the Around Oregon Annual Juried Exhibit at the Corvallis Arts Center.

LBCC’s South Santiam Hall Gallery is open Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.