Photographer Hugo Platt explains his love of landscapes (and nudes) (From York Press)

Photographer Hugo Platt explains his love of landscapes (and nudes)

10:50am Wednesday 1st February 2012 in Exhibitions By Charles Hutchinson

ACOMB photographer Hugo Platt will give a talk tomorrow evening at Bar Lane Studios, Bar Lane, York.

From 6pm to 7pm, he will discuss selected works on display in his retrospective exhibition of Landscapes And Nudes, offering insights into his working methods.

Those methods for much of his landscape work involve his use of a Wista Field 8 x 10 camera, now on display in the gallery. “The size of the negative it produces holds incredible detail,” he says. “I realised how important this was when photographing landscapes when working in the dark room in the late 1980s.”

The silver gelatine prints on show span 1986 (Glen Etive, Scotland) to 2010 (Hole Of Horcum, North Yorkshire) and all have been printed in the darkroom by Hugo, right, from negatives. Photographed in black and white with no human presence, the landscapes often evoke a sense of isolation, their starkness enhanced by the broad white mounts and thick black frames.

The photographs emphasise how landscapes and the elements hold sway over the human imprint, not least in the two photographs of York in flood in 2001 at the lock and the racecourse.

Hugo has taken his camera to Yugoslavia, Iceland, Spain, South Africa, France, Italy, Bulgaria and Mount Kinabalu in Borneo. Closer to home, he has photographed Cornwall, the Trossachs and Fylingdales, as well as York. The skylines may change, the contours too, but the pin-sharp detail is the constant factor.

From landscapes the focus switches to nudes, or human landscapes if you prefer, and once more your eye follows the curves, like the lay of the land. These bodies do not have the sexual thrust of a Helmut Newton, being studies of form rather than sensuality.

The exhibition runs until Saturday and the works are limited to editions of 20 prints, each signed, embossed, titled and numbered. Some photographs are available as reproductions, priced at £60 unframed. Additional framing costs £45 (large) or £25 (small).