Born: 1951
Hometown: Glasgow
Based in: Catalunya
Ian is originally from Scotland but he has lived in France and Spain for the last 20 years.
His background is in Fine Art, which he taught for nearly ten years before leaving the UK to live and work in France. His involvement with photography started back in the seventies.
After he finished Art School, he worked for two years as a Museum Photographer for a group of museums in the north east of England.
In the eighties, as well as teaching full time at Art School, he further developed his photography both in a personal and commercial sense. His work was regularly published by Art publishers and magazines. After leaving the UK in the nineties he developed an interest in digital production.
Photography has always followed technology so for Ian Sanderson , as a professional, it was a logical step to learn and adapt to the world of digital capture. His experience with printmaking helped him to understand and use the new way of making images. He was one of the first wave of photographers to use and manipulate images using Adobe Photoshop.
After over a decade of ‘pixels’ , Ian Sanderson began to think again about his archive, the thousands of silver gelatin negatives captured over forty years, negatives that are objects you can hold, not images trapped on a computer hard drive. Although digital images can be printed with superbe quality and definition, there is still a problem with longevity.
The photograph as an object with it’s imperfections and the mark of the ‘maker’ is an art.
To this end he started investigating processes that provided an ‘object’ and had longevity. The answer was in the two techniques from the 19th-century that provided both, Gum Bichromate and Platinum Palladium.
What inspires you?
Life
Describe your creative process.
Looking , working and making
What are 3 words that best describe your work?
Sensual, composed, sincere
Who are some artists that have influenced your work?
Too many to mention
What is the most important tool when creating your work?
My vision
What is the best piece of advice you have been given?
Process in more important than product
Where do you go for inspiration?
Everywhere