Matthew Fertel

Paleo#

Steel Your Face#

Artist’s Statement#

Paleo is part of a series of images that were discovered on a weathered piece of plexiglass that I found leaning against a wall. I put a piece of white paper behind it and placed it in a window to backlight it. Returning daily over the course of a week, I captured multiple images of different sections of the plexiglass under different weather and lighting conditions, until it disappeared one day.

Steel Your Face is part of a series of images that were found on a discarded piece of sheet metal I came across during a walk. Over the course of a month, I went back to it again and again, at different times of day under different weather and lighting conditions, capturing the changes that occurred, until it too disappeared one day.

I primarily use an older iPhone to capture images. Accepting its limitations, I have learned what to expect from different lighting conditions, and how best to take advantage of what the iPhone has to offer as a creative tool. I shoot full-frame with little or no cropping to maintain high resolution for printing. Basic editing is done post-capture. No filters or effects are used.

About the Artist#

Matthew Fertel is a Sacramento-based photographer who has worked at Sierra College since 2004. Before that, he was a fine art auction house catalog photographer in San Francisco for over ten years. Find him online at mfertel.wixsite.com and on Instagram @digprod4.