“Hi Julie, thank you for taking the time for an interview. First, just let
us know a little bit about you: Who are you, what are you doing?"

Thank you for having me, it's great to be talking with you today. My name is Julie Hamel, and although I have lived across the US, the North East is home. As a young child my father converted part of our basement into a darkroom. I can remember tinfoil covering small windows and images appearing out of nowhere. It was not until a college Photo I course that I understood what was actually happening in those early foggy memories.

I have now been using photography as an artistic medium for over a decade and recently received my MFA earlier this year. Within my work I tend to slide across the spectrum of digital to analog while creating labor intensive, hand-made, or alternative process images. The work itself reflects on the broader context of exposure, time, and sensitivity, while simultaneously representing what may be absent or present, whether visually or emotionally.

"Which roles do photography and art in general play in your life? From
what I glimpsed so far, it doesn’t seem like just any rationally made
career choice that you leave in the office at 5 in the afternoon."

You caught me. If I were a plant, my home care instructions would be ‘low light, lots of creative watering.’ My day job is in the arts, but that is because I cannot seem to turn off my [creative] brain. Even when I worked at an office, I kept trying to find ways to sneak the arts in. Those that process best by listening, or auditory learners, may often have music on and verbal learners intake by speaking and reading. Naturally I am a visual learner, so the world around me, all that I see, is continuously being sorted through lenses of color, composition and light. It is a constant absorption. At home, my walls are crowded with handmade original art; hours of labor framed and hung to remind me of what I deem important. Art and expression are human, and I cannot think of any other way to live. 

"What do you 'look for' something with/in your photography?"

I work a lot in the moment. I may gather, plan and scout out locations, but it really comes down to what is working for me visually or emotionally while I am creating. I search for balance, that can be a tonal range or just the ability to have your eye move around and not get stuck. I know it is working if I keep looking at it, if I care to search for something in what I am creating. The most successful images are the ones I repeatedly come back to, which I believe is also a balance in the relationship between the viewer and the art. Images that are slower to reveal themselves mean you can live with them longer, there is always more they can communicate. 

"When I look at your works, I see a variety of duality aspects: Not only
the one of viewer and art, also analog and digital, time and space,
absence and presence, short moments and long time-spans. It is most
obvious in your series 'Altered Negatives', in which each pair of images
resembles two parts that need each other to be whole."

Yes, if there was a common thread in my works, in any medium, it would be relationships. To each other, to nature, to moments, to places, etc. I believe all the dualities you mentioned have to do with these intimate interactions. It comes down to considering how every one of our connections are dynamic and fluid, changing over time; the speed, proximity or physicality of those associations. Everything is a perpetual state of ebb and flow, a constant consideration of how we view and mark these relationships.

As for the Altered Negatives, my interest in the pinhole camera was in correlation to what reciprocity failure meant for the medium. With a shutter speed over a second, reciprocity failure needs to be considered and calculated for a proper exposure. (As the silver halide that makes up the film’s emulsion reacts to light, it loses its potency over time and needs longer to develop.) During this expanded exposure, the film now exists in a constant state of sensitivity. Which is a fitting metaphor for relationships, or even the ending of them.

Shooting with a pinhole led to a warped space in and out of the camera. I could work within a 3D space which is impossible in a traditional 4x5 film back. Allowing for in-camera alterations and the layering of film/objects became a way for me to construct a connection that inevitably would be severed. During processing in the darkroom, items attached to the film degrade and disappear, leaving one to consider what is absent and what is present. Those are the moments that catch me off guard and leave me interested in each unique interaction. 

"Can you tell us more about your workflow? So far, it seems to have
strong aspects of working intuitively in the moment as well as being
conceptual."

I always have something in mind, almost a clear picture of what I want to accomplish visually. However, it is important to be flexible in the moment. The light may be different, a branch too high, or limbs that cannot bend toward the direction anticipated. This constant problem solving is a large part of my workflow.

For me there has to be a ‘process’ in order for it to be successful. Happy accidents happen along the way, but they are usually in the form of steps to something larger. My hand has to be a part of what I am making, whether it is hours of editing in photoshop or blindly/physically altering film in the dark (before the photograph is even exposed.) The more ‘me’ I can put into the images, aid in the conversation of how something is made past a decisive moment. Sitting with the work before and during creates a natural connection to want to sit with it when it is completed. That is what interests me when looking at art by others. If there is time and care put into something, I feel a sense of corresponding respect when I view the works. It is a timeline or a life more than a snapshot, made not taken.

"This reminds me of something I observe in contemporary art and
especially artists who fend for themselves on social media: It’s not
only about the artwork itself and what it shows. More and more it’s
about the person behind the work, their opinions and what we know about
how the work was created. Often, we can even see steps of the making-of
which weren’t accessible in the past. What do you think about this
development in modern art?"

I have definitely seen a rise ‘of the hand’ in creating. With technology progressing so much in cameras, 3D printing, etching etc. I feel that artists are going back to their hands to create more personal and impressionable items in a mass-produced world. In the past, a print may have been about perfecting a photograph in the darkroom. Not being concerned with how much of it had been burned or dodged, filtered or spotted. It was more of an awe. A spectator’s sport of viewing the people and places that we could not travel to. Now with access to so much of the world (thanks to transportation and the internet), I think people have shifted to wanting a connection or knowledge about the work/maker, an understanding past the visual.

As an avid collector I tend to associate objects with people. I love the idea of art being about the maker and their journey towards the final conversation, living past what is hung on the wall. The ‘behind the scenes’ that artists are now sharing allows us to feel a deeper sense of understanding and appreciation in their creations. I believe the process to make the work is a big part of what it means to be a maker. For instance, a series of animal portraits I have been working on, I chose to tone the cyanotypes prints which changes the color of the final presentation. I could easily tone with coffee, tea or a number of other substances, but I decided to use acorn tannins because of the correlation between a source of food and its consumer. It shares an enriched connection to the work although the aesthetics may have a similar outcome. I think it is really exciting to see how artists are communicating and creating in these social spaces and how they are presenting their processes to others which would normally happen behind closed studio doors.

"As for to the connection between food source and consumer: Which role
does the land play in your practice? Already our first glance onto your
website with the bird triptych at the entrance reveals a deep connection
to the natural world and other beings surrounding us."

I was fortunate enough to grow up before a lot of technology took hold. Always in a tree or diving into a lake, these connections with the land (and those that call it home) have been a part of me since a young age. Any object that held my attention, would make its way into my dirt lined pockets. These items – sticks, frogs, mushrooms, feathers, shells, or bones – were magic to me. How is it possible for birds to fly? How does a leaf unfurl or a butterfly change?

Nature is able to give and take as much as it needs to survive on its own, and flourish. It is exquisite and intimidating, continually cycling between new growth and utter silence. So much of our environment is a push and pull between the strong and the vulnerable, growth and loss. That is one of the reasons I love the Northeast. I get to live these cycles and lessons each season, and photograph them too. 

"Through which ways can one support your art? I noticed that on your
website, unlike many other artists today, there is no online shop to buy
prints or publications."

That is true. One of the easiest ways to support any artist is sharing their work with others, as well as getting in touch with them. I have a contact page on my site and if someone has an inquiry or wants to purchase a piece, I am happy to have them send me a note. A lot of my works are not digital, they are one of a kind handmade objects, so it’s harder to click ‘print’ and sell multiples as some do. Much like my images, I feel there is an intimacy through conversation with a person instead of clicking a button to acquire. These are the kinds of relationships that I hope can be seen reflected in my photographic works.

"What are your next projects, short-term goals and long-term dreams?"

That is an intimidating question. I just completed a huge lifelong goal which was to get my MFA. Short-term, as I am sure we all are thinking, is getting through this pandemic. Staying stable, making art, and keeping others safe.

There are a few projects I am currently working on, the Altered Negative series, the brushes of animals and some others in early phases, brainstorming. Short-term would be to keep making, long-term would be completely submerged in the arts. I am currently working as a Community Program Coordinator at a Gallery/Art Center as well as helping out with a new startup gallery. It is not enough for me to just create; I need to be surrounded by others that belong to the same tribe. I would love to be showing work and having these conversations with other artists in a larger capacity.

I have strongly been considering how each series, or the individual pieces we create, are deeply rooted in who we are as makers. A mentor once said to me that, “[These works] are all branches of the same tree.” As time moves forward, I hope to better understand what this tree needs to grow, and care for it accordingly.