Kenneth Snelson with his modified #16 Cirkut camera

Kenneth Snelson is an internationally known sculptor whose work is perched on the edge between art and engineering. Distinctive from the use of rigid tubing, strung together in taut webs of metal cables to make geometric, crystalline forms that in many cases appear to defy gravity.

Since 1975 he has experimented with various ways of making panoramas using a Widelux swing lens camera, later moving to a Cirkut which let him make 360 degree panoramic views. His father had been a professional photographer and had used a Cirkut camera to take large group photos. His best known pictures are views of European cities, as well as New York.

Brooklyn Bridge,1980. contact silver print, 15 1/2" x 91 1/2"

Snelson's #16 Cirkut uses 16 inch wide film and can produce a single negative up to 20 feet long. He has modified it so the Goerz Dagor lens can be quickly moved to one of eight positions to control where the horizon falls in the picture.

He built the elaborate contact printer below, for exposing the prints. A grid of light bulbs inside the contact printer serves as a light source. By using bulbs of different strengths and placing sheets of tissue paper between light and negative, he can control exposure in different parts of each print.

Left, laying out a 16" wide by ten foot long negative in his contact printer and right, changing bulb sizes to adjust print exposure

BIBLIOGRAPHY: Charles Hagen and Warwick Clarke, Camera Arts January/February 1982