1st place
gold star award
Doug Caplan
canada 
Photo © Doug Caplan
title
Hong Kong Brutal Compressions
After several years in the darkroom, Doug decided to take a hiatus to spend time on family and start a successful business in the engineering / construction industry and to re-think the direction of his work. Fast forward to 2010 and Doug was re-energized and re-focused on his craft from a different perspective. The many years of darkroom work honed his ability to see things from a point of view of contrast and tonality inherent to monochromatic images but applied to color.
Spending many years in the construction industry, Doug has developed a passion for the urban environment wrapped in the architecture that surrounds it, often presenting images with an abstract point of view. A signature feature of Doug’s work is the intentional lack of human existence and the frequent inclusion of reflections and repetitive patterns to infer human existence.
Rather than showing his work in random arrangements, Doug prefers to present his art in thematic sequences. The flow of thought is an important element in his work as viewers move from one image to another. Each image is a single part of the whole sequence and work together to form a single thought.
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entry description
This portfolio explores the brutal compressions of Hong Kong architecture from a street level point of view. Hong Kong is one of the most population-dense cities in the world. The average apartment size is about 450 square feet but most live in apartments less than 200 square feet. The true feel for the living compression that most Hong Kongers exist in can only been seen and experienced from the ground where the architecture surrounds you.about the photographer
Doug is an artist born in Montreal and currently based in Langley, British Columbia, Canada. His passion for photography started in 1993 with a Nikon 35mm camera. Within a year Doug was slugging around a medium format Mamiya M645 camera and attending Ampro Photo Workshops in Vancouver learning everything he could about the science and art of photography. In 1997 Doug built his own darkroom and started developing his own film and producing monochromatic prints.After several years in the darkroom, Doug decided to take a hiatus to spend time on family and start a successful business in the engineering / construction industry and to re-think the direction of his work. Fast forward to 2010 and Doug was re-energized and re-focused on his craft from a different perspective. The many years of darkroom work honed his ability to see things from a point of view of contrast and tonality inherent to monochromatic images but applied to color.
Spending many years in the construction industry, Doug has developed a passion for the urban environment wrapped in the architecture that surrounds it, often presenting images with an abstract point of view. A signature feature of Doug’s work is the intentional lack of human existence and the frequent inclusion of reflections and repetitive patterns to infer human existence.
Rather than showing his work in random arrangements, Doug prefers to present his art in thematic sequences. The flow of thought is an important element in his work as viewers move from one image to another. Each image is a single part of the whole sequence and work together to form a single thought.
back to gallery
