Artists Statement
The Spotted Pony
presented by Dona Bollard and Billy Hyden
The Spotted Pony is a journey through the minds, imaginations, visual senses, and intertwined spirits, of two individuals committed to preserving the traditional darkroom methods of fine art photography. This collaboration of wits and wisdom between Dona Bollard and Billy Hyden has continued to carry forth ancient methods of photography, choosing to print exclusively utilizing these methods. Most images are printed on a gelatin silver paper, then bleached and toned either in selenium or a sepia toner. These chemical colorations provide hues reminiscent of the first types of photo printing, such as Van Dyke, Salt Prints, Kallitypes, and some of the photogravure's. Platinum and palladium are additional development methods which are utilized and produce rich velvety blacks and smooth grey tones.
Dona Bollard grew up in Connecticut, moved to Florida and landed a job with the Palm Beach Post. She worked in the fashion and editorial departments there before moving to Boston where she was employed with the Boston Globe, again in the fashion and editorial departments. Eight years ago her move to Santa Fe, introduced her to Billy Hyden who had experience photographing equine and western themes in Texas for many years. At this point photography and darkroom styles were really blended together and a free flowing dreamy style of photography was developed. Both have won numerous awards including best of Photography at the Tempe Festival of the Arts.
Primary subject matter includes capturing the inner spirit of the espiritus equine. These magnificent creatures, located primarily in the last frontier areas of the United States, are photographed in their natural environments, in a way which captivates the viewer. Deep inside the stallions eyes, you imagine Apache and Ute warriors looming in the distance. Each image of our fine art photography takes its own spiritual journey through time and process, manifesting in that EXACT moment in time "click" which we choose to begin to express our artistic capabilities.
Some of our most thought provoking images are in our Feminine Spirit pages. Heidi challenges the viewer to many queries, while the Earth Mother represents such basic ideals as peace, serenity hope and love. Our Southwest/ Native American pages include local modern Native cultures, combined with ancient Native ways.
a gallery of fine art photography
