fully automated systems, which generally allow for
less intervention for various artistic effects.
TriciaLouvarSeealso:Adams, Ansel; Burning-in; Conservation;
Contact Printing; Cropping; Developing Processes;
Digital Photography; Dodging; Dye Transfer; Expo-
sure; Film; Filters; Group f/64; Hand Coloring and
Hand Toning; Image Construction: Perspective;
Manipulation; Non-Silver Processes; Photogram;
Print Processes; Safelight; Sandwiched Negatives;
Solarization
Further Reading
Adams, Ansel.The Print. Boston: Bulfinch, 1995.
Anchell, Steve and Bill Troop.The Film Developing Cook-
book. New York: Focal Press, 1998.
Curtin, Dennis, Joe DeMaio, and Roberta Worth.The
New Darkroom Handbook. 2nd ed., New York: Focal
Press, 1997.
Grimm, Tom.The Basic Darkroom Book. 3rd ed. New
York: Plume, 1999.
Kodak.Kodak Black & White Darkroom Dataguide, 6th ed.
Rochester, New York: Silver Pixel, 2001.
Langford, Michael.The Darkroom Handbook. New York:
Alfred A. Knopf, 1984.JUDY DATER
American
Judy Dater’s career in photography as an artist
and teacher spans nearly 40 years. Beginning with
black-and-white portraits in the 1960s, Dater’s
work has richly evolved alongside the changing
technologies of photography. Although primarily
known for nude portraiture, Dater’s work inher-
ently defies narrow classification due to the com-
plexity and range of her subjects, the emphasis she
places on the photographic event itself, and the
mental exchanges between artist and subject.
These aspects of physical and psychological dialo-
gues turn the traditional posing of portrait photo-
graphy into an event or performance that is
memorialized in the photograph. Throughout the
1960s and 1970s, Dater’s cutting-edge style and
impulse for an image to act as something or some-
one, rather than to merely represent it, led to
comparisons to artists such as Diane Arbus and
Richard Avedon.
Born in Hollywood, California in 1941 to a
middle-class family, Dater’s exposure to image
and performance in Hollywood coincided with
her father’s work as a movie theater owner. To
pursue her interest in the arts, Dater attended the
University of California, Los Angeles as a student
of drawing and painting in 1959. Three years later,
she transferred to San Francisco State University
where she studied under photographer Jack Wel-
pott, and by 1966, Dater graduated with a mas-
ter’s degree in photography. Welpott and Dater
worked very closely together, and in 1964, Wel-
pott introduced Dater to Imogen Cunningham, a
photographer noted for her pioneering male
nudes. Cunningham would prove to be a singular
inspiration in Dater’s life and work. During this
period of study, Dater had her first exhibition at
the Aardvark Gallery and Bindery in San Fran-
cisco, where her nude portraits addressed Amer-
ica’s questioning of cultural values and norms in
the 1960s.
Dater’s work gained widespread recognition fol-
lowing her 1972 exhibition at the Witkin Gallery in
New York. The open and direct confrontation or
relationship between Dater and the subjects of her
portraits bore evidence that her work inspired reac-
tions. The nude portraits expressed personal con-
frontations and an intense self-awareness that led
Dater to expand her understanding of the portrait,
and she began a quest to further expose the psy-
chological aspects of her subjects. Two of her most
recognizable photographs include several charac-
teristic elements of Dater’s work. In Twinka
(1970), a photograph of the model Twinka Thei-
baud, the image implies that the nude in the sheer
dress has been caught in some sort of urgent
exchange with the camera. Dater also photograph-
ed the woman whom she most admired, Imogen
Cunningham, as one of her subjects inImogen and
Twinka(1974). This photograph documents the
tenuous relationship between artist (Cunningham)DATER, JUDY