Today we’d like to introduce you to Ed Freeman.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Ed. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
I’ve been taking pictures my whole life; it’s been my profession for the past thirty years. I started out doing headshots for actors, gradually moved into shooting commercial work, then travel landscapes all over the world for Getty Images. Nowadays I pretty much focus on making large format, fine art prints which I sell in galleries, through art buyers and client direct internationally via my website, edfreeman.com
My image-making runs the gamut from scenic to underwater nudes to complete abstracts. I have an ongoing series of pictures of dilapidated buildings throughout the American West called Western Realty that’s been the subject of a dozen museum shows. The underwater nudes are especially popular in Asian countries – China in particular, for some reason. A gallery in Germany is selling my semi-abstracts of desert cactus and some surfing pictures.
Every picture I make is tweaked in Photoshop, sometimes to the point of being unrecognizable. My new abstract series doesn’t even look like photography, and sometimes it isn’t. Traditional photography is always an option, but I’m fascinated by all the new computer-assisted possibilities and I’m taking full advantage of them.
Has it been a smooth road?
I was up to my eyeballs in debt for years before things turned around. I’m incredibly fortunate that these days, I have enough of a reputation that people search me out for my unique style and for pictures I make on my own, not on assignment; it wasn’t always that way. When I was shooting headshots, there were maybe a half-dozen good headshot photographers in Los Angeles; now there must be hundreds. Glad I don’t have to compete in that market anymore.
Technology has in effect killed what used to be photography and replaced it with a whole new art form. Taking professional-quality photographs used to require skills that only a professional would know about; these days, anybody with a cell phone and a good eye can take amazing pictures. So, professionals have had to move fast to stay ahead of the pack.
I’ve always been fascinated by stretching the boundaries of photography, so I’ve embraced all the technical advances enthusiastically. I feel for people who are more concerned with what’s been lost, as opposed to what’s been gained in the process.
We’d love to hear more about your business.
I’m an artist, pure and simple. I make pictures. I used to be afraid of calling myself an artist, because I thought that was too lofty a word to describe what I do. But now I think of “artist” just as someone who generates visual product, and I’m comfortable with saying that’s what I do.
At least, that’s what the outside world sees, and pays for – visual product. The process of generating it is a profoundly moving, aesthetic, psychological and spiritual experience. And the amazing thing about being an artist is that you actually get paid to grow aesthetically, psychologically and spiritually. If that’s not the most fantastic job you could possibly have, I don’t know what is.
Is our city a good place to do what you do?
Los Angeles is my adopted home (I’m originally from Boston) and I love it. When I moved here in 1978 it was a backwater, hick town compared to what it is now, but it still had “innovation” stamped all over it back then, and it still does today. Los Angeles can be superficial, tasteless and naive. But it can also be ground-breaking, visionary and relentlessly committed to a better future. Let other places celebrate and perpetuate past glories. That’s all very well and good, but that’s not what we’re about. We’re about creating a new and better world. If ever there were a “shining city on a hill,” we’re it. And we’re here to kick some serious ass. Is there a better place on earth to live right now? I don’t think so.
Contact Info:
- Website: edfreeman.com
- Phone: 2136873113
- Email: [email protected]
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/edfreemanphotographer
- Other: https://www.facebook.com/Ed-Freeman-Fine-Art-129906254351476/
Image Credit:
Ross Schapheer
Carlos Palmieri
Ted Sun
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