Kate Baker
Kate Baker
"AN ALCHEMICAL JOURNEY OF CONNECTION"
KATE BAKER
KATE BAKER
"Photography is an alchemical journey of connection."
About
KATE BAKER
I am an Australian fine art photographer. I studied at the Australian Centre of Photography, with further studies under master printers Gordon Undy, Michael A Smith & Paula Chamlee. Since 2005 I've exhibited in galleries in Australia and Europe. My work is held in collections in Australia, the US and Europe. I have gallery representation in Berlin.
Embracing monochrome expression within my art, the handcrafted gelatin silver prints are made in my darkroom in Warburton.
About Kate's
Processes
I work primarily with black and white film and use a range of small, medium and large format cameras. Occasionally I use digital in a hybrid analog process. My film cameras are all old, some more than 80 years old - they are all my friends.
The darkroom
Handcrafted gelatin silver prints are made (by me) in my darkroom in Warburton in the beautiful Yarra Valley. Fresh mountain rain water is used in my processing of both film and paper photographs. Working in the darkroom is like being in a temple to me, it's a hallowed space and I lose all sense of time and space other than the immediate moment while I am in there. There is nowhere near the range of photographic papers available as there used to be however I use a beautiful high-silver-content paper from the Czech Republic - everything about this paper makes me happy including its occasional variances between batches.
it's a process that's worth taking time over
Paper is delicate and so it takes a lot of care and focus to make sure each photograph is created with a long archival future in mind. There are so many parts to the process it is easy to get a long way down the road and then decide it isn’t good enough! Often I will spend a whole day in the darkroom to get a print that is ‘just right’… which is a joy as I love it but definitely a little heartbreaking if later I decide it’s not going to get to the final stage of sharing it with the world!
preparing for presentation
Once a photograph 'passes the gate' I like to mount it in a beautiful high quality archival museum board (warm white). This way the artwork is presented the way I want it to be seen and I know the materials are high quality which helps it last the test of time. Plus I know it will look good in a frame. Photographs that have been made using good processes and stored in archival quality materials can easily last over 100 years - I always make my work imagining someone might see it many years in the future!
A little visual
A little visual shows what it takes to make a Silver Gelatin photograph - and this is just the darkroom printing part… there are many steps both before and after this!
Feedback from others
Education, Exhibitions, Grants
Online viewable PDF of CV Kate Baker March 2024
- 2024 Thru the Lens - YAVA Gallery - Australia
- 2023 Women Only - Johanna Breede PHOTOKUNST Berlin
- 2023 Fantasy Faeries & Myths - YAVA Gallery (group)
- 2022 Works on Paper - YAVA Gallery (group)
- 2021 The Tower - Warburton Waterwheel Gallery (solo)
- 2021 The Dance - Yering Station (solo, paired with Emmy Mavroidis, sculptor)
- 2019 Face to Face - YAVA Gallery (group)
- 2018 Evocation - Warburton Waterwheel Gallery (solo)
- 2016 Nijinsky and the Ecstasy of the Divine - Arts Centre Melbourne (solo)
- 2015 Dances with Lyrebirds - Burrinja Gallery, Upwey, then Healesville Memo
- 2015 Leap and Pause - MARS Gallery, Melbourne (solo)
- 2015 Das Fenster - Johanna Breede, Photokunst, Berlin, Germany (group)
- 2013 Frauen / Women - Johanna Breede Photokunst, Berlin, Germany (group)
- 2013 Kate Baker Selected Works, Light Factory Gallery, Melbourne (solo)
- 2012 Coonara Collective, Point Light Gallery, Sydney (group)
- 2012 La Poesia della Danza, Harrison Galleries, Sydney Australia (solo)
- 2009 Australiana, Meyer Gallery, Sydney (group exhibition)
- 2008 Unseen – Hopes and Dreams, Meyer Gallery, Sydney. (solo exhibition)
- 2008 Finalist, The Olive Cotton Award, Tweed River Art Gallery, NSW (exhibition)
- 2015 Paper Sea Quarterly (Australia) : Issue 9 - feature article
- 2014 Looking Glass Magazine USA ‘The Ethereal and the Sublime’ - cover + pages 4-43
- 2008 Fridays at Oasis - Hardcover publication, 47 duotone images ISBN 9780646493787
- 2019 Perpetual Trustees - funding for project “Inspired by Myths and Fairytales”
- 2018 Shire of Yarra Ranges - Arts & Heritage Grant - Seen and Heard Boy to Man
- 2017 Creative Victoria and Shire of Yarra Ranges - Liminal
- 2017 Shire of Yarra Ranges - Arts & Heritage Grant - Seen and Heard - Boy to Man
- 2016/17 RACV Community grant - Seen and Heard - Boy to Man
- 2015 Shire of Yarra Ranges Arts & Heritage Grant - Dances with Lyrebirds
Johanna Breede Photokunst - Berlin
http://www.johanna-breede.de
June Bateman Fine Art - New York
https://www.junebateman.com/
Journal posts View all
Sometimes I open my studio to visitors - if you would like to visit, please let me know your email in the link below and I will let you know opening dates. If you have a particular artwork you'd like to see in person before you buy it, feel free to email me directly HERE
Get in touch
I'd love to hear from you if you are interested in a particular work or series of works. Or to visit my studio.