Judy Dater
A quick word about this interview is that it is a republishing of a discussion I had conducted with Judy for Edition 3 of Analog Forever magazine back in 2020. It was incredibly well received and helped us sell out the edition quite quickly. It did my heart good to see her and her work resonate with a predominantly newer audience. It says something that she has continued to add to the lexicon of photography for so long. Hers is a career in this industry that anyone would aspire to.
Putting this interview out there for the masses, or at least for those who had not had the opportunity to purchase the print journal, had me looking back once again over what we had talked about, where she was with her work at that time, and then again with what she has continued to accomplish since. What I noticed right away is that there is no hitting pause when it comes to making new work. She has continually made new images and explored new ground with how and why she (especially) makes portraits the way she does. No grass grows beneath her feet.
What this did was remind me of something from my introduction to her in the original text preceding our interview. It read:
“Judy Dater is someone who you may refer to as a photographer’s photographer - meaning that she is someone who has set an aesthetic that others might see as a way forward for their own work, without intentionally copying it. It is this influence and inspiration that helps direct us towards a particular goal. Bucking trends and following a personal vision have always been her way. With an unwavering approach to portraiture and inclusivity always a part of her journey, she has a profound curiosity for those in front of her lens.”
And that is where we are, even today, with the images she makes. She’s not resting on her laurels and saying this is all I have. There’s always more to explore and think about during the investigations she conducts with her imagery. This is a life of photographs that endures over time like no other. To say she inspires is common amongst so many, yet entirely accurate.
So, let me stop wasting your time and let you get on with her words and images. May they wash over you and allow you to build upon your own aesthetic and career, no matter what you may do. Cheers, my friends.
Sharon Moore, 1971
Bio -
Judy Dater was born in Hollywood, California, on June 21, 1941, and grew up in Los Angeles. Her father owned a movie theater, so movies became the prism through which she viewed the world, and they had a profound influence on her photography. From 1959 to 1961, she attended UCLA, majoring in Art. In 1962, she moved to San Francisco and completed her education at San Francisco State University, majoring in photography.
She became part of the community of the west coast school of photography, primarily represented by the photographers Ansel Adams, Edward and Brett Weston, Wynn Bullock, and Imogen Cunningham. Edward Weston was no longer alive, but the others all took an interest in her work and encouraged her to pursue photography as a career. Imogen Cunningham was particularly influential as she was the only one in the group whose primary work centered on portraiture.
Her career has been long and varied, combining teaching, creating books, traveling abroad and conducting workshops, making prints and videos, and photographing continually.
Interview -
Michael Kirchoff: Let’s start at the usual place with an interview like this. Many great photographers were clearly meant to be visual artists, so I have to ask, what do you think it was that started you down the road to making images? Where did the initial interest in photography come from?
Judy Dater: I have always been a visual person, from as early as I can remember. My father owned a movie theater in Hollywood, and I grew up looking at images on the big screen. My dad always enjoyed taking photographs, so I was used to seeing him with a camera around his neck, and I wanted to try it. I think another early influence on my visual curiosity was a lot of exposure to painting in particular. My mom would take me to the museums, which I considered a treat, and there were several art books in the house that I loved looking at. I was drawing and painting at a young age and taking art classes on Saturday mornings at the age of 13.
Paolo Tenti, Rome, 1998
Massimiliano Stefani, Rome, 1998
Russ Ellis, 2003
Ena Everett, 2005
MK: It is well documented that Imogen Cunningham had a profound and lasting impact on you as a friend and mentor. The photographic world was (and still is) dominated by men, yet she made incredible strides as a photographer. It seems obvious that you have carried that torch for women throughout the years after her passing and after publishing Imogen Cunningham: A Portrait. How has her influence shaped your career and work ethic since then? Is she still a factor in how you create art?
JD: She did have a profound influence on me as a budding photographer. She was 80 years old when I met her, and I was in my early 20s. She took an interest in me as a very young student as I was one of the few photographers in my generation photographing people. Most of my fellow students were photographing the landscape a la Ansel Adams. We hit it off, and she invited me to visit her at her tiny house on Green Street in San Francisco. We were friends for years after. I loved her photographs right from the beginning, the way she used light, and how she captured a subtle expression and conveyed emotion. I had opportunities to watch her photograph others and was also photographed by her. These opportunities allowed me to study her behavior and how she moved and spoke to her sitters. She was both gentle and engaging, almost floating as she moved around. I don't work exactly like her, but watching her gave me a place to start and things to think about. She was a role model for me as a young woman starting out in photography because I could see that photography was a viable profession for a woman. If she could do it, maybe I could too. She was also a whole person. She had been a wife and mother, had myriad interests such as horticulture, cooking, reading poetry, was interested in politics, and had hundreds of friends of all sorts. She worked hard and was photographing up to the time of her death. Her final project was photographing people over the age of 90. She said it was very hard to find lively elders like herself, but she did, and I just wanted to be like her and still do.
MK: I love hearing these stories of Imogen! There was also some influence and a bit of an embrace of your work by members of the highly influential Group f/64 during your early days, isn't that right? Did this come with its own set of pros and cons, and did it help propel you forward in any way?
JD: I had the privilege of meeting and knowing a few of the members of Group f/64, but I was never part of the group. They had an important exhibition at San Francisco's De Young Museum in 1932, before I was born. By the time I got involved with photography in 1963, the group had long disbanded. I did, however, know a few of the members, Ansel Adams, Brett Weston, Imogen Cunningham, and Willard Van Dyke. I was very lucky as a student to have an opportunity to visit Brett and Ansel, as well as Wynn Bullock, in their homes in Carmel. A couple of times, my graduate class drove to Carmel to have a visit with them and show them our work. Brett was very generous and would let us all sleep on his floor in sleeping bags and then fix breakfast for us in the morning. Brett later sent me occasional letters with a sprig of pine needles included, inviting me to come visit him and use his darkroom. I never took him up on that. Ansel would have us come by at 5 PM, serve cocktails, and show us his darkroom and workspace. This was an unbelievably glamorous and thrilling experience for me. Ansel, Brett, and Imogen were all very encouraging to me about my photography. The influence on me from the group came through my introduction to first studying their manifesto when I was a student at San Francisco State University. The manifesto was still considered relevant at that time, particularly amongst the landscape photographers. Their use of the smallest aperture, f/64, to render maximum sharpness was something I tried to embrace, but it did not really work so well for me when I did portraits of people. If I used such a small aperture, then my exposures would be very long, and my sitters would invariably move. I found that I could go to f/22, and that would shorten my exposure time to about 1 second, which seems to be the longest a person can hold still without making a blurry image. 1/2 second is even better.
When I became a graduate student in 1966, I was part of a group from my class, the only woman founding member that formed The Visual Dialogue Foundation, patterned roughly after f/64. We exhibited our work together on several occasions, created a limited edition portfolio, produced a few catalogs of our work, and in the last two years of our existence, we gave a lifetime achievement award to 2 photographers we all greatly admired and respected, Imogen Cunningham and Edmund Teske. We had two raucous dinners to present the awards, which were some very funny and funky trophies. It was great fun.
Ansel Adams, 1977
MK: Having made many iconic photographs during your career, you’ve also reached iconic status yourself. Have you ever felt that fame, either yours or your subjects, created a more difficult environment for you to get the photograph you wanted to make?
JD: Not at all. Most of the people I have photographed have absolutely no idea who I am. I try to treat everyone the same as I photograph them, giving them equal respect no matter who they are or what they do. I have photographed a few famous people, but they all have been kind, patient, and considerate.
MK: In speaking of iconic photographs of yours, we cannot go without mentioning Imogen & Twinka at Yosemite, 1974. This is quite literally one of the most famous and recognizable photographs in history. How has making this image changed your life, and do you feel that it helped or hindered you with your career moving forward?
JD: It has been mostly a gift. People really love that photograph. They have wanted to own a copy, and that has been helpful in allowing me the freedom to do what I want with my life and my photography. The downside is that I am so identified with that photo that I feel sometimes it overshadows everything else I have done. I don't consider it the "best" photograph I have ever taken, but it is a crowd-pleaser.
Imogen and Twinka at Yosemite, 1974
MK: Following this narrative of your career reminds me that your early collaboration with Twinka Thiebaud led to an ongoing working relationship. How has the collaborative element furthered your work as a photographer?
JD: I have photographed Twinka on several occasions, especially in the early 70s. She was a wonderful model and gave herself generously to the photo sessions. We always stayed in touch over the years, though we lived in different states. In 2014, 40 years after I made my photo of her and Imogen at Yosemite, she came to Berkeley, and I photographed her again at my studio. The resulting photo, printed here, is called Woman in a White Slip. It shows a strong, older woman who looks like she has lived a full life. I thought it took great courage for her to pose for me again after so many years, not afraid to show who she is in the present moment. I didn't want to title it Twinka this or that, hence the mysterious title. But I now think it is of great interest that this is Twinka now and not the young nymph from 1974. We both have come a long way since then and are proud of it.
Woman in a White Slip, 2014
MK: You continue to be a working photographer, and it is clear that the passion for photography has never waned. What is it about this medium that has kept you transfixed on making images all of this time?
JD: I have always loved the ability of a photograph to create the illusion of reality, even a straightforward, simple image of someone or something. The viewer wants to think it is really that person or that thing and establishes a kind of bond or connection with the image. But photographs aren't reality. Photographers edit, manipulate, direct, and choose faces and expressions to convey what they want. For me, it's like directing a movie.
So, in that vein, I use my sitters as actors to create photographs that imply stories. These are not linear narratives but are instead meant to suggest feelings or ideas to the viewer. I want my images to provoke a response, but it is the viewer who will write the story based on their own personal experiences and what they bring to the image. Two people looking at the same photograph may come up with entirely different readings, and that's fine with me. I just would hope they would look at my photograph long enough to elicit a response.
My photography opens doors to new people and new situations. It is what I know how to do what I need to do, and I still enjoy doing it.
MK: You are closely associated with feminism, both as a worldview and an aesthetic in your images. How has this been woven into the social fabric of your photographs, not to mention your life?
JD: Someone asked me at a lecture recently how I would define a Feminist. I said, "Someone who is strong and independent and does what they want." I practice it in both my work and life. I was born a feminist but didn't really know its name till much later. I was a tomboy, willful and difficult as a child, and I always wanted to do just what I wanted to do. I didn't think it was fair that the boys seemed to have all the fun and freedom to do things like sports, fishing, and building things while the girls were supposed to wear dresses and play with dolls. I resented the restrictions on girls.
My early portraits of women showed women as real people, not Playboy models or objects of male desire. They were feisty, confrontational, and often highly sexual, but they owned their sexuality. The message was, "men beware." I followed this project with a series of nudes and portraits of men. Most male critics, museum curators, and gallery owners rejected this work. It made them terribly uncomfortable. Almost all of the work that followed, my series of nude self-portraits, the portraits of Californians, and my series on gun owners called The Gun Next Door, all have been rejected for one reason or another at the time I made them, though eventually, they have all been embraced. I absolutely believe in my work and continue to "do what I want."
Maxine Hong Kingston, 2015
Lynda Leung, 2016
Jessica Peters, 2016
John Halfacre, 2016
MK: Your approach to portraiture is often very direct and reflects the character of each person. Clearly, a way of working towards the comfort of your subjects is a top priority in gaining their trust to open up to you. How have you garnered this trust over time? Was it always this way?
JD: I have always empathized with all of my subjects, no matter who they were. I wanted to make them feel comfortable and relaxed and encouraged them to play a part for me. I don't have any idea how an acting coach would do this or a movie director, but I feel it is my role as the photographer to direct my sitters. I talk with them, I joke with them, I encourage them. Using my big, wooden, old-fashioned-looking camera is a great asset. People are fascinated with it, and they are not afraid of it. It is my greatest ally.
MK: You’ve had a long-standing relationship with making self-portraits throughout your career. I’m wondering what brought you to work within this spectrum of the medium. Has it simply been an extension of the portraiture you’ve always done, or is there more to it than that?
JD: Many young women, when they first start out in photography, gravitate to self-portraiture. I think it comes from a desire to explore one’s identity. I did that as early as 1963, in beginning photography. I came to realize I could continue that investigation by photographing other women around my age, fellow students, and acquaintances, and I had more control without having to be on both sides of the camera. After photographing other people for many years, I went back to doing self-portraits. I was turning 40, and I again wanted to deal directly with my identity. No longer young, I faced approaching middle age. This was a new phase of my life that merited investigation. After working on this body of work for about five years, I returned to photographing others, and then, as I was approaching 70, another milestone, I created a visual memoir, an overview of my life from birth to that moment.
For me, dealing directly with myself as the subject is a good way to take stock of who I was, who I am in the moment, and where this might take me next.
Self-portrait with Sparkler, 1982
Self-portrait Holding up rock, 1983
MK: It would not be proper of me to ask at least one question related to the tools used to make your photographs. I know that you have more recently included some digital companions, but before then, what were you using? Did the format or use of film have the necessary impact and effect you were looking for in the look of your photographs?
JD: I have used 35mm, 120mm, and 4x5 format cameras. My main camera has always been my 4x5 Deardorff. That camera, with its rectangle ratio, suited my desire to do portraits and nudes perfectly. I learned from the qualities of black and white film how I wanted to render my subjects as a grayscale image. I learned how to pre-visualize the scene I was looking at in color and how that scene would translate into a black-and-white print. My most recent portraits of gun owners were all shot with film and my 4x5. I then scan the negatives and make archival pigment prints.
I only recently began to use a digital camera and my cell phone to make images.
MK: I always like to ask those with a lifetime of experience in photography if they have any thoughts or advice for those willing to take the plunge into photography as a career. Any words of wisdom?
JD: Study the history of art and photography so you don't think you have invented the wheel. If your desire is to be a fine art photographer, be sure to have a day job as well. Many practicing photographers also teach. Living off the sale of your work, while not impossible, is very rare for the vast majority of photographers. If you are interested in doing commercial work, you will have a lot of competition, so you had better be the best.
MK: From the very beginning of your career, you were pushing the envelope and creating some controversy with your photographs, most notably in your embrace of the photographic nude for both women and men. Was this intentional, or the reaction of the general public that spurred it on?
JD: I think I answered this already in my response to the feminist question. To restate it, I have always done what I want, straight from my gut, instinctual, coupled with an awareness of the zeitgeist.
Cherie, 1972
Nehemiah, 1975
MK: You continue to create an incredible legacy of photographs for generations to admire and appreciate. What do you want people to take away from your art and the messages it offers?
JD: Since I have photographed all types of people of every age, male and female, clothed and naked, of countless ethnicities and various sexual orientations, I would like people to recognize that all people are beautiful, intriguing, both strong and vulnerable, all deserving of respect, and only human.
MK: I know that you’ve been working on a recent project under the pandemic situation we all find ourselves in. Some new assemblage style work with journals and an analog approach to making them, based a bit on your previous Memoirs collection. Can you tell us a little about that?
JD: Since the pandemic was first acknowledged, and all of the seven mayors of the Bay Area where I live declared a shelter-in-place mandate, I recognized the importance of documenting this life-changing situation we all have found ourselves in. I started taking pictures of what I saw around me on my morning walks, on TV, the food I cooked, when someone would drop by, and on other occasions, when I would venture out for essentials. I call this project my Plague Journal. I have taken most of the photographs with my cell phone; I print them and then paste them into my leather-bound journal and write the date and some kind of entry regarding the situation. Sometimes, it's one word or just a few words; other times, the commentary is a bit longer. My desire is to convey a sense of what I have been experiencing, to make the pages evocative and diaristic, straightforward, and also poetic.
After I create the page, I scan the whole double-page spread on my scanner, make a file, and eventually print out the individual pages quite a bit larger than the original pages. I imagine I will continue to do this until we are released from this nightmare.
MK: What do you feel is the best way for you to grow as an artist? Are there any fears behind treading new waters?
JD: I learn something from each new project that I make. It is all cumulative. I seem to need long periods of downtime between each project to recharge my batteries. I don't fear treading new waters, but I hate having to learn new technologies. After spending some 50 years learning my materials with black and white film and making gelatin silver prints, I was forced to embrace scanning and digital printing. This was a major setback for a while, but I finally figured out how I could best utilize the new technology to suit my aesthetic.
I have been interested in other mediums and explored them to different degrees over the years. I have worked in painting, printmaking, film, video, performance, installation, and even hand-cast papermaking. I think it is great fun to try a new medium, but in the end, photography has given me the most powerful tool to express how I feel about the world.
You can find more of Judy’s work on her website here.
All photographs, ©Judy Dater
