Brenton Hamilton: 20 Years

Maine-based photographer Brenton Hamilton employs unconventional approaches to photographic techniques and materials to achieve his layered, dreamlike visions. This exhibition surveys Hamilton’s long career creating images using 19th century handmade photographic processes. Serving as inspirations for Hamilton’s compositions are his ongoing studies of cultural history, sciences, early medicine, minerals and oceanology. Often working with collage and using liquid photographic emulsions as paint, Hamilton pushes the traditional boundaries of photography, offering a fresh interpretation of the medium. A wide range of historic processes including cyanotype, black glass ambrotype, tintype and gum bichromate —as well as an astonishing hybrid of media —offer a bridge between the antique and the postmodern. The exhibition also includes 18th century sculpted heads and objects that provide a glimpse of the unique source material often depicted within the artist’s compositions. 

Credit: Exhibition overview from museum website.