Kerri Stephens - Golden Gate
Archival Print on Metallic Pearl Paper 2020

Kerri Stephens - Ferry Point
Archival Print on Metallic Pearl Paper 2020

Kerri Stephens - The Plains
Archival Print on Metallic Pearl Paper 2020

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Varnish Fine Art co-owner Kerri Stephens carries forward her infamous family legacy of “trick photography” with fantastical photo manipulation prints. Over a century ago, Kerri’s great-great grandfather Alexander Martin arrived from Scotland to become one of the first photographers in the American Southwest, capturing the likes of his friend Buffalo Bill, Annie Oakley, Native Americans and miners. Introduced to Harry Houdini by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle as “a noted psychic photographer and very wonderful man in his particular line,” Martin excelled in the art of double exposure to create photographs of “spirits” for the great illusionist. Growing up in the Colorado mountains where nature became her cathedral, Kerri learned photographic and darkroom techniques from her father, winning a Kodak Award and National Award for Excellence for darkroom manipulation by the time she was in High School. In this body of work, Kerri blends her love of nature with classic Sci-Fi fantasy. “I wanted to blur the lines of our natural world, from the past to the future, from beauty to horror, from the real to the unbelievable and all the possibilities in between.”