Episode 84: Adrian Whipp - Lumiere Tintype

Scott David Gordon — Tue, 03 Mar 2020 08:00:00 -0600

"I think art for me has always been about giving someone an image that they can get absorbed into, and that takes them to a place that is sort of hyper-real. You know it’s not reality but you also can’t quite pin down what it is or where it came from. I see that in the tintype process as well. It’s quite arresting as a modern person to be photographed in a tintype because it puts you in this other world where you know it’s you and you know it’s modern photograph. But you’ve never seen anything like it and it breaks you out of that pattern of being so well versed at looking at imagery."

Adrian Whipp is a passionate and driven photographer who has chosen to pursue more rare, challenging, and unconventional ways of making images. He is probably best known for his family heirloom level of portrait making in the form of tintypes that he captures in his custom mobile photo studio at the back of the French restaurant Justine's Brasserie here in Austin. When not doing that he is full on pursuing the creation of his own version of stereo photography, manifest soon in something called The Daydream Society. What I see is an inherent fascination and generosity in what he creates and shares that is really intriguing and inspiring. I encourage you to tune in and keep and eye on what he is up to. If you make it over to have your tintype made, which I highly recommend, make sure to let Adrain know you heard the podcast. And definitely check out the beautiful work on his website, adrianwhipp.com, and be sure to specifically check out the daydream society and sign up to get email updates. Please enjoy this wonderful conversation with Mr. Adrian Whipp.

Lumiere Tintype portrait

Lumiere Tintype Photography

Studio located behind Justine's Brasserie
4710 East 5th St,
Austin, TX, 78702

Hours - Thursday - Sunday, 6pm until 11pm

Lumiere Tintype portrait

Some of the subjects we discuss:

Photography
Cathedral of light
Fixing images
Preserving time
Slowing down
Finding photography
Discovering tintype
Portrait studios
Ease of digital
Losing analog
Quick turnaround
Lumiere tintype
Family tradition
Justine’s clients
15,000 so far
Out in the world
It’s not about me
Portrait photogs
My domain
It’s an experience
Stereo photography
Mostly forgotten
The Aleph
3D images
Making glass slides
Looking at things
Breaking the pattern
Cave paintings
Translating experience
The art world
Banksy shred
Miami banana
Co-creation
Generosity
The cookie
Look at this
John Coffer
Mexico trip/travel
Daydream society
Making slides
Where to find him

Stereos - The Daydream Society

Adrian's bio couitesy of his website.

Adrian is a photographic artist based in Austin, Texas. Born in the UK, Adrian received his Bachelor of Arts in Visual Communication before moving to the US in 2007 to pursue photography.

In 2013 Adrian founded Lumiere Tintype, the world's only traveling tintype portrait studio. Lumiere serves as an attempt to make honest, timeless portraiture that helps people to reconnect with the lost alchemy of a handmade photograph. In the past six years Adrian has shot over eleven thousand tintype portraits, images that he hopes will be cherished for generations to come.

Outside of Lumiere, Adrian’s photographic work plays with the idea that our notions of photography are beginning to detach from the rules of perspective. As digital technologies continue to reshape our understanding of what a photograph can be, we are discovering immersive new ways to become transfixed by the power of an image.

For example, in Adrian’s cathedral of light, we see that a photograph can be elusive and ephemeral - impossible to capture or ‘fix’. It can exist only as a luminous play of light and color across ground glass - we meditate upon the image in the same way that we watch time pass.

A photograph can also exist without a single, fixed viewpoint. Inspired by Chinese scroll paintings, Adrian built the Aleph - a projected photographic landscape that can never be viewed in it’s entirety, only in sections. Each viewer charts a different course as they explore the image plane, leading to very different interpretations and memories of the same work.

Adrian’s latest endeavor - the daydream society, explores the aperspectival realm of stereo photography - a technique that uses the viewer’s own visual cortex to blend two fixed perspectives into one fully dimensional image. These fascinating, three dimensional (four if you include the duration of exposure!) images can only exist in the imagination of the person viewing them - in the material world they are merely two flat photographs, sitting alongside each other on a two dimensional plane.

Photo of Adrian by Jonathan Canlas

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

Intro music generously provided by Stan Killian

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Austin Art Talk - Episodes Tagged with “Adrian Whipp”

Episode 84: Adrian Whipp - Lumiere Tintype