A Landmark Perspective: Evan Hiltunen

Hints of Evan Hiltunen’s second career first arrived while visiting his foster brother in Alaska. Though he dates the start of his career in photography to March 3, 2003 (when he finally purchased a good camera), the first taste for picture taking appeared that preceding year during those four months in Alaska. Hiltunen’s sister-in-law had talked him into buying a pocket camera for the trip. He tried it out and was soon hooked.

One of his brother’s friends was a pilot who took them scud running. It wasn’t the typical aerial tour of Denali that most tourists take. The experience of shooting toward a mountain outcrop at twenty miles above the ground, then turning up at the last second was exhilarating - difficult to capture on a pocket camera, but an exercise in split-second timing.

Timing is an issue that Hiltunen is keenly aware of, as both a photographer and retired chef. Both professions require complete absorption in the moment and knowing exactly the right time to act. The timing factor is something he takes so seriously that he has deliberately opted to spend the next three to five years “living unfettered, rootless.” He has given up his house and put most of his possessions in storage, just so that he’ll be able to go off on assignment at a moment’s notice. He plans to “travel lightly,” he says, and to “do it with a purpose.”

Landmark Perspective
Hiltunen’s first career as a chef began when he left home at thirteen. He learned his way around a kitchen through what he calls, “old fashioned apprenticeship,” and at seventeen ended up being taken in by a foster family who were also “hard core foodies.” They owned a restaurant and soon Hiltunen was invited into the fold of the business.

Focusing on North Regional, Italian, and French cuisine, Hiltunen worked his way around and was eventually drawn into the fast-paced culinary lifestyle, where drink and drugs are a common way of coping with the intense pressure. By the time Hiltunen turned thirty, he knew that he was burning out and needed a change of pace.

"The higher the quality restaurant, the more extreme it is,” says Hiltunen, “there’s so much stress and people who work in kitchens tend to be perfectionists, creative, etc. At the end of the night, you’re just shaking from the adrenaline because of the pressure. There’s sometimes just a two second interval between perfection and completely destroying the food. On top of that, you’re timing and controlling what everyone else is doing…You have to have extreme focus, and a short attention span comes with that.”

After years of working in an environment where the shift progresses rapidly, frame by frame, plate by plate, it’s no surprise that Hiltunen developed a perspective that lends itself well to his art. He acknowledges that there are many artistic similarities between cooking and photography. Years of experience in the kitchen taught him a great deal about composing plates, working with colors, textures, and shapes. With photography, there may also be a mere two-second window for the perfect shot – when the sun shifts or an expression becomes veiled, the moment can be lost forever.

Hiltunen shows me a few photos that illustrate the comparison. The first is a photo of the Ferris wheel at sunset. “It took me two years at the State Fair, waiting for just the right conditions,” he tells me. The first year, he could picture the exact shot that he wanted, but it never panned out. The next year he returned to the site and waited around for a few hours until the sky hugged the massive wheel just so.

The other picture, entitled Landmark Perspective, was also the result of Hiltunen’s persistent effort to get it “just right.” Whenever he got a chance, he’d walk over with his camera and circle around the site, looking for the perfect angle, the perfect sky, and trying to minimize interference from other architectural styles in the area.

A Sense of Wonder
When asked about his artistic vision, Hiltunen responds that he’s “not making any statements about life and society” with his photography. To pursue such statements, he feels, would be akin to getting tunnel vision. Inherent to that approach is the risk of compromising the integrity of the artistic work itself. There are a lot of photographers out there “putting out aesthetically crappy stuff, but the audience doesn’t feel right about rejecting it because of the deeper meaning underlying the work. It’s like, you can’t tell someone that their baby is ugly, because the baby has meaning to them.”

On the other hand, Hiltunen says, there’s a difference between a photo that’s technically good and one that captures a certain mood or emotion. For example, you could have a picture of something like a doorknob where the lighting is perfect and the texture is well defined, but it would still be just a picture of a doorknob. The objective, he tells me, is to “bring the two things together.”

What interests Hiltunen is being able to capture a sense of wonder in the life around him. He focuses mainly on positive forms, including the synchrony of architectural lines, the human capacity for experimentation, or barometric differences revealed against the skyline. Vintage cars, breath-taking landscapes, and human forms are common subjects, but the surrealist perspective shows up from time to time as well. He enjoys working with models and appreciates the difference between those who are totally at ease in front of the camera versus those who show their authentic moments in between the poses.

Hiltunen also confesses to a fascination with photographing people who have undergone heavy tattooing and body modification, in the form of piercings and implants. He’s already got something in the works along these lines and tells me about a particular shot he’s planning out in his mind’s eye: a close-up of a man’s face with two fish hooks inserted into each cheek and stretched to eyelet holes on either side of a frame.

“I’m still learning,” says Hiltunen, “still experimenting.” Looking back at some of his earlier shows, he can see evidence of how he has progressed along the learning curve, “I would now do better printing, better framing and matting.”

Some of Hiltunen’s distinctive tongue-in-cheek terminology pops into the conversation from time to time. There’s “Guy With Camera Syndrome,” a term applied to photographers who get “right on top of” the subject. There’s also the “Mark Dayton Syndrome.” Hiltunen says, “He’s a good guy, but sometimes he just looks like he’s been caught in the headlights.”

A self-described political junkie who once also worked for the Secretary of State, Hiltunen occasionally indulges in subjects that touch on political issues. His portfolio includes visual reflections of the Native American occupation at Alcatraz (1969-1971), and shots of the “ Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence,” a GLBT group that was placed on the Papal List of Heretics in 1987.

“Hey,” he says, “I’ve got a solution to the voting problem, a way to make it more restrictive, so that it’s more of a privilege and people are motivated to get involved: mandatory attendance at a government-type meeting. If you want to vote, then you have to attend at least one civic meeting every two years – school board, city council meeting, whatever. It’s a way for people to understand the process and it’s not like it’s a huge commitment…. once every two years.” He pauses, then smiles and says, “Of course, I’d probably be one of the first to complain that I don’t have the time.”

No Starving Artist
Though a relative newcomer to the profession, Hiltunen’s drive and dedication to the craft have already earned him some impressive credits. His work has been exhibited in places such as Coffman Union (University of Minnesota), the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, and the Minnesota Museum of American Art. In January 2005, he was named to Rake Magazine’s “Most Recommended” list, and his work has since appeared in the Art of Recover (Minnesota State Arts Board) and Utne Magazine.

Hiltunen was scheduled for a month-long exhibition this August at the Copenhagen Cultural Center in Denmark, but circumstances intervened with an unfortunate setback. While attending the St. Paul Art Crawl earlier this year, a pick-up truck parked nearby caught fire and rolled onto Hiltunen’s car. Basic insurance didn’t cover all the damage, so Hiltunen had to pay for expenses out-of-pocket. He hopes to participate next year instead.

One of the keystones to Hiltunen’s approach to the photography business is this: he is determined “not to be a starving artist.” This means not over-extending his resources and it means finding a good balance between the “meat and potato jobs” and the “haute cuisine.”

Although Hiltunen’s long-term goal is producing museum quality pieces, he acknowledges the benefits of having a steady stream of regular assignments. Things like band shoots and taking pictures of houses contribute to his bottom line and make other pursuits possible. His approach is, above all, a pragmatic one intended to secure sustainability in a profession where there are no guarantees.

Coming from a reserved, Midwestern background, Hiltunen says it’s easy to be reticent when it comes to marketing his own work. “Pimping myself,” he jokes, “is not something that comes naturally to me…I prefer to be behind the lens.” He remarks on how many good artists there are out there who never get off the ground because they aren’t able stomach the business side of the profession. The avoidant approach is something he refuses to consider for his own future.

Again, it’s a matter of finding the right balance. “Take Salvador Dali, for instance,” he says, “he produced his best stuff in the early part of his career. The later part of his career – it was mostly marketing himself, the mustache, the lobster thing. Or Andy Warhol – all marketing, but he was a genius at it.”

Still, Hiltunen would rather be at work behind the camera. His ideal would be doing something for publications such as National Geographic or Condé Nast Traveller, “I’ve always had a wandering bug.” Hiltunen has already been criss-crossing the States for work, capturing the distinctive sights he finds along the way. He’s been spending time on reservations, attending festivals, and wandering the piers looking to match the right subject to the right market. He’ll be heading out to Santa Fe in the near future and is currently considering a trip to Morocco.

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Photos by Evan Hiltunen