This exhibition represents a selection of early photographic imagery by Stephen Althouse, all being black and white silver gelatin analog prints made in the darkroom. Some of these prints were chemically sepia-toned by the artist to add a brown tone to the prints. Other prints were skillfully painted over with oil paints by the artist to produce color characteristics uniquely different than conventional color photography.

Althouse’s current premeditated approach to making art is evident in these early pieces; he first mentally conceives the image, and then finds and carefully arranges his subjects, later to be photographed and skillfully printed. Similarly in these earlier works, Althouse uses metaphors to denote profound personal life experiences and symbolic representations of humankind’s attributes, such as creativity, spirituality, and destructiveness.

Throughout his career as an artist, Althouse has recurrently used religious symbols suggesting humankind’s spiritual nature; some may be found in this exhibition referencing his experiences in Mexico (images of Christ) and in Egypt (Toth’s ibis head). Old weapons, which may characterize our destructive nature, recur frequently in Althouse’s work, and in this exhibition a stone axe head and blowgun darts may be found; additional indications of his time living and traveling in South America. Althouse sometimes intertwines musical instruments within his works, perhaps contemplating our creative nature. Piano keys against Arabic leatherwork are in this exhibition, also linking his personal experiences of travel in Northern Africa.

To further deepen the conceptual layering of his artwork, Althouse adds undecipherable phrases to his imagery, as are found in this exhibition in Latin, Zapotec, and Braille.
Althouse comments, “I often use Braille to suggest our metaphoric blindness and inability to ‘see’…. implying humanity’s lack of insight throughout our long history of repeated triumphs and disastrous mistakes.”