Ronnie Buchman Schonzeit, RBP
I have been a photographer for over 50 years. Like many of us in my generation, my first camera was the simple Kodak Brownie. What began taking pictures of my backyard blossomed thru the years culminating in receiving a degree in BA in Photographic Communications from R.I.T, certification as a Registered Biomedical Photographer, a career in surgical and medical photography, and a studio in Manhattan.
My passion has taken me to study with Ansel Adams, Nile Root, Neil Salvin, Leon LeBeau, and Lew Webb, along with strong early role models in Georgia O’Keefe, Lennart Nilsson, Eliot Porter, Edward Weston, Diane Arbus and Annie Leibovitz and Nile Root.
At first, the craft of photography was learned in my suburban basement, which was magically transformed into a darkroom by my father and first mentor and teacher, Sidney Buchman of blessed memory. He taught me the ability to create something from nothing, learning that sometimes things are not as they seem, and if I was not satisfied, I had the ability to change it; that there were many ways to see any given situation.
It was a place of magical thinking and a world of calm. A place where time stood still. The darkroom became my life's classroom. It was a place where science, math, meditation, and art all merged together wrapped in a blanket of love and patience.
Time stood still. There was no judgement. There were no mistakes; only opportunities.
It was a place where I learned that photography was a metaphor for life itself.