Mark Deneen of Eureka is the grand prize winner of the third annual Humboldt Photography Exhibition, which runs through Sept. 16 at the Redwood Art Association’s gallery at 603 F St. in Eureka.
Awards were presented to Deneen and nine other award winners during Arts Alive! last Saturday.
Deneen’s black and white entry, titled “Transmission,” was selected from 135 entries in the juried exhibition.
”It was a real surprise because the picture I entered is one of my favorite photos of the last few months. I just wanted to enter the photo I liked best. one I absolutely love,” he said.
Deneen has been taking photographs seriously the past few years since retiring. He works in film and converts his negatives to digital images on his computer. He shoots in the 120 format with a Mamiya 7 camera with rangefinder and says he prefers shooting with film to digital photography. He likes the feel of working with the film and developing it himself. He owned a stereo component company that specialized in high-end systems before he retired.
For his winning photograph, he received an Adobe CS5 Premium Suite, software that is the digital equivalent of a darkroom.
Mary Ann Machi won the Redwood Camera Club Founders’ Award of $100 for her picture, “Pansy.”
Best of Show awards of $100 were won by David Boston for “Waters Edge,” Dawson Darling for “Munich Stairway,” Bosha Struve for “Technologies,” Jesse rather for “Samoa Fog” and Deborah Ketelsen for “A Parent’s Work is never done!”
Honorable Mention awards of $50 each went to Barry Evans, Wes Juliana, Michael Harris, Lori Mangini and Jeanne C. Scranton.
Juror Godfrey DiGiorgi was enthusiastic in his praise of the work and the show organizers. He said his judging became detail-oriented because there were four or five entries on equal footing in each of five categories he devised to organize the work.
After the judging, a reception was held where entrants were invited to ask questions about photos, their own or others.’ DiGiorgi said questions reflected a “passionate desire to learn, to understand, to improve on their work.”
DiGiorgi summed up his remarks by saying, “This is an excellent show, a fine showing by dedicated photographers bent passionately on making excellent photographs.”
The exhibition is underwritten for the third time by Pierson Building Supply and co-sponsored by Redwood Art Association, the Eureka Photoshop Users Group and the Redwood Camera Club.
