Biography

Born in Utrecht, the Netherlands in a working-class environment. Heavily influenced by this circumstance, it can be recognized in how I look at the world and in the way it destined my interests and how I try to shape my photographic work.

I have followed a meandering life path that ranges from the desire to become an artist/philosopher/architect, through working as steward on the magnificent ocean liner "Nieuw Amsterdam", as a traffic technical designer (thanks to Alderman Theo Harteveld), a group transport coordinator, a study in philosophy (1973-1976, Utrecht University), a few years as a photographing truck driver and under the supervision of Maestro Hans Götze in Haarlem (1979 – 1980) to a professional career as an independent artist/photographer.

Since 1981 I have my own photographic practice with an emphasis on architectural photography. In the beginning the photographic specialization was limited to assignments in documenting realized designs, but gradually expanded to include the built environment in the broadest sense of the word.

The next two decades I worked as a photographer for architects, magazines, publishers, and other companies active in the world of architecture. In addition, the development of free work with the theme “traces” as the common thread.

In the next phase, I conducted extensive research into the legacy of the Dutch modernists and their influence on contemporary architecture and this common thread was converted into an independent abstract photographic visual language. The relationship of light and space remained a recurring theme in my photography. For this project I received a grant from the Municipality of Utrecht, Visual Arts Committee. Documenting Sanatorium Zonnestraal in 1993 was part of this project.

The work for architects, magazines, editors, and publishers ran alongside my autonomic work. This last track often consisted of objects that have fulfilled their role in society and are approaching perfection as young ruins with as central theme “traces”.

Over the course of the last decades (the 2000s), a collection of Modern Ruins developed that, as independent images, focuses on the beauty of decay. There is a layering in these images that offers the viewer room for multiple interpretations and associations.

The foundation is being laid for the “Traces of Deterioration” project. Another big change in my free work is that color photography has also started to play an important role, in addition to the traditional artisanal black and white work on gelatin silver prints. The development continues and a few years ago I also started capturing outdoor space as shown in the “Desolate” series. I have also made attempts to get a grip on an architectural/landscape space such as the second Maasvlakte and the battle fields in North-Eastern France.
Another big change in my free work is that color photography has also started to play an important role, in addition to the traditional artisanal black and white work on gelatin silver prints. The development continues and a few years ago I also started capturing outdoor space as shown in the “Desolate” series. I have also made attempts to get a grip on an architectural/landscape space such as the second Maasvlakte and the battle fields in North-Eastern France.

An artist-in-residency in the former Sanatorium “Zonnestraal” in Hilversum inspired me to work on a triple layered project. Abstractions, collages with the pavilion as subject; photographic impressions of the architecture before (1993) and after the restoration; and portraits of people who had somehow been involved in the pavilion in combination with their own photographic memories and legacies.

From 2005 till 2018 I have been teaching architectural photography at the Utrecht Centre for the Arts.

In the winter of 2019, 2020, the Dutch Dooyewaardstichting offered me a four-month artist-in-residency in the former workshop of Piet Mondriaan in Blaricum in the Netherlands. Here I found a different kind of “traces”, the heirs of what once was the millennium old community of the “Erfgooiers” (968 – 1979) and I started to document the descendants.

In 2016, the “Venezia Quotidiana” project began, which in 2018 led to the research and documenting of traditional or non-traditional artisanal activity in Venice: “Venezia Artigiana”. By now this project has extended to a massive body of work with portraits of 150 artisans, complete with photographs of their workspace and close-ups of their hands, the most important tool of an artisan. My passion to bring this to life is visualized in a short documentary by Suzanne van Leendert, with the title “Traces of the Future”. This was released in 2023.

Herman H. van Doorn
Utrecht, May 12, 2024