Eliot Allen
Eliot Allen is an occasional street photographer and urban planner with an international practice based in Portland Oregon. His photographic work began in the 1970s at Photo-Art Studios as a lab tech and photographer’s assistant. Since then, photography has been an adjunct to personal and professional travel. His images of Asia, Europe, Latin America, and the U.S. from the 70s through 2000 are in 35mm film, and 35mm digital since 2000. A handful since 2017 are mobile phone images. He is a member of Blue Sky, Oregon’s center for photographic arts.
Artist’s Statement
To paraphrase Garry Winogrand, I photograph to find out what something looks like photographed. I enjoy geometry, juxtaposition, ambiguity. And the work of painters like Carmen Herrera, Sol LeWitt, Richard Diebenkorn, and Robert Bechtle. A great image is one that contains several possible narratives or finds an unexpected abstraction. At the end, it’s about catching moments of visual serendipity.