Seeing the Comstock's mining ruins through the digital lens

Since his days working with a box camera in San Diego, Ralph Phillips has reveled in photography. He loved the art and the creativity that came with working in a dark room.

Then color photography came along and, well, it just wasn't Phillips' style. So he stopped shooting.

"I've done watercolors and ceramics, too. I've always been interested in the creative stuff," he said.

Phillips, of Carson City, worked for the Nevada Department of Transportation for many years as an engineer, but spent his free time flexing his creative side.

Then two years ago, when he was 78, digital photography and photo alteration by computer got him back into his long-lost hobby. Now he is preparing his first exhibit, scheduled to open Tuesday at St. Mary's Art Gallery in Virginia City and run through Aug. 31.

The exhibit titled "American Flat Revisited" includes altered photographs taken at the old cyanide mill north of Gold Hill. The buildings are covered with graffiti, which served as one of the principal draws for Phillips.

"I shot a series of pictures a year ago and then went back six months ago and couldn't find any of the old stuff," Phillips said. "It's in a constant state of change."

While each of the shots is stylized, using several photo-development techniques, it was the structures themselves that inspired Phillips to take the 14 photos in the exhibit.

Among his favorites is a work titled "The Ponds," which features concrete pillars splashed with graffiti and piles of discarded paint cans.

"That picture gives a good overall picture of the graffiti, the structures and the artists' tools," Phillips said.

In addition to the American Flat photos, Phillips is working on several other projects, including "Dayton's Backside," which includes photographs of the back of buildings in Dayton.

"You go around the back of some of these buildings, and it's quite interesting what you find, with all the junk that is behind some of them," Phillips said.

SMAC Executive Director Mimi Patrick said St. Mary's works to provide space for artists struggling to get their work shown.

"We keep changing the galleries on both floors to bring new people into the gallery, but also to showcase more artists," she said. "It can be so hard for artists to get their work exhibited or get gallery space."

• Contact reporter Jarid Shipley at jshipley@nevadaappeal.com or 881-1217.