John Chiara creates his own cameras and chemical processes, in order to make unique photographs that use the direct exposure of light onto reversal film and paper. Each resulting photograph is a singular, luminous object. This highly anticipated first book includes the surreal and thrilling landscape and architectural images for which the artist has become known. John Chiara: California features images taken in the artist’s hometown of San Francisco and other locations along the Pacific Coast. An essay by Virginia Heckert situates Chiara’s work in the landscape tradition of the American West and discusses this process-driven work.
John Chiara (born in San Francisco, 1971) received a BFA in photography from the University of Utah in 1995 and an MFA in photography from the California College of the Arts in 2004. Most recently, he was artist in residence at Budapest Art Factory (2017) and Crown Point Press, San Francisco (2006, 2016). In 2011 and 2013, the Pilara Foundation in San Francisco commissioned work that was included in group exhibitions at Pier 24 Photography.
Virginia Heckert is photography curator and head of the Department of Photographs at the J. Paul Getty Museum, Los Angeles.