Some days I look at my husband and think how odd it is that I have been cohabiting with a stranger for a significant part of my life.  We come from different backgrounds, with different kinds of parents and childhoods, different kinds of education and life experiences and yet we make it work out of love an respect.  But I know that it is impossible to know the person that captures your gaze on a daily basis.  We can’t completely unlock each others secrets but we can learn to truly “see” each other.

Photographer Kevin Kline set out to examine this subject with his project, A Stranger to Me.  A collaboration between Kevin and Bruce Schultz, the subject of the photographs are Kevin’s partner for 16 years, Brian, resulting in photographs that explore a relationship on many levels. Shot in an ice fishing tent to create a camera obscura, these large scale tin types provide insights for both the photographer and the sitter, and ultimately, the audience.

Kevin was born in Indiana and educated in San Francisco.  His work has been exhibited in museums and galleries across the country, recently in the Ogden Museum of Southern Art.  His photographs are held in public collections at the New Orleans Museum of Art and the Ogden Museum of Southern Art.

Bruce was born in Nevada, Missouri and educated at LSU with a BA in Journalism.  He is a self taught photographer, with a passion for wet plate processes.

A Stranger to Me

A Stranger to Me is series of over-sized tintypes exploring a relationship of 16 years by means of metaphor, allegory and factual re-interpretation. These images are a reflection of my relationship with my partner Brian. It is a work in progress, focusing on issues of race, boredom, sexual identity, poverty and beauty, among other things. These tintypes, which measure 19in’ x 23in’ and 20in’ x 24in’, are made in collaboration with Bruce Schultz. Schultz has fashioned a camera obscura by attaching a Cooke 530mm lens to a red ice fishing tent. This serves as the camera, and also the darkroom–with exposure times ranging between 16 and 22 seconds. With this work, we are exploring the idea of trying to know someone—the feeling of knowing them well, and then at times, not at all. It’s an attempt to make something that expresses a desire, the frustration and the occasional contentment of trying to find intimacy with another human being.