WYNN BULLOCK, The Cactus, 1958, 9x7.25" Gelatin silver print, Printed 1958, Signed in pencil on mount recto below right of print. Titled, dated, and numbered in ink on mount verso; photographer's address stamp; Edna J. Bullock collection stamp; typed description label: D. Cactus on Jack's Peak, chosen as lead picture in New York exhibit on love.

Wynn Bullock made prints of unmatched quality and precision. The craftsmanship and luscious tones of his beautiful prints were equal to those of Edward Weston and Ansel Adams.

Wynn Bullock was born in Chicago, Illinois in 1902. Bullock originally studied in New York City to become a vocalist and toured with Irving Berlin's Music Box Revue. While in Europe, he came across artists such as Cezanne, Man Ray, and Lazlo Moholy-Nagy, and subsequently took a different creative path. In 1938, he attended the Los Angeles Art Center School and only three years later his work was shown at LACMA in a solo exhibition. He began experimenting with the darkroom process of solarization, wherein some areas of the photograph are exposed to light, creating interesting ranges in contrast. Much of Bullock's work was inspired by Edward Weston; they shared a similar aesthetic of isolated macro shots of seemingly ordinary objects, conveying a much deeper, mathematical beauty of nature. Like Weston, Bullock was an exquisite craftsman of photographic printing, producing with Weston and Adams some of the finest gelatin silver prints of his generation. A large collection of his were part of the five founding groups that started the Center for Creative Photography, the others being Ansel Adams, Harry Callahan, Aaron Siskind and Frederick Sommer.

Bullock's photographs Let There Be Light and Child in Forest gained prominent attention when they were picked by Edward Steichen to show in the 1955 Family of Man exhibition at MoMA and the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C. Both pictures stood out to audiences and by the end of the decade, Bullock was published worldwide and honored with a medal from the Salon of International Photography in 1957. 

In the 1960s, Bullock took a creative turn and experimented with colorful abstractions, a stark divergence from his highly contrasted black and white photography. Later in the decade and into the 70s, Bullock expanded his role into other fields. He became a trustee and chairman of the exhibition committee at Friends of Photography in Carmel, California. He also taught advanced photography courses at the Chicago Institute of Design, as well as a guest instructor at Ansel Adam's Yosemite workshop. 

Wynn Bullock died at the age of 73 in November 1975.

CREDIT: https://www.peterfetterman.com/artists/49-wynn-bullock/biography/

Excellent. Minor wear.