Herb Ascherman

November 20, 2008

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Herb Ascherman

Black & White Photograhper
Quality Expression

by Melanie J. Ross

Article rating: 7.67

When Herb Acherman was growing up there were always cameras around the house. At age 12 he put together his first photo essay and at the age of 28 he turned professional. Herb lives in Cleveland, Ohio and he is an entirely self-taught black and white fine art photographer with an expertise in portrait/social photography.

After receiving two master’s degrees in areas other than photography and working for a short time, Herb decided that he wanted to work independently and run his own business, while doing something that he enjoyed. Naturally, photography was the choice. That was 27 years ago in 1975.

He hasn’t looked back yet. Through sheer force of will, without a background in photography or knowledge of how to run a business, Herb achieved commercial success as well as artistic acclaim. He has published two books of portraiture of the Cleveland Orchestra, in addition to The Artists Project, a book of portraits of artists from the Midwest. His work has appeared in national and international publications and in 1992 he had a 20-year retrospective at The Butler Museum of American Art in Youngstown, Ohio. Herb’s work is known outside of the states as well. The Bibiotheque Nationale and the Musee Du Photographee du European in Paris have collected it extensively.

Herb taught himself photography through reading and collecting books. His collection currently consists of 2000 books, many of which are signed. Since he never had any formal education or training in photography, books have always been his mentors. He learned from some of the best, including Yousef Karsh , the master of heroic photography, and Arnold Newman , who invented environmental portrait photography.

On any given day, you might find Herb in his library, preparing and researching for a lecture at the Cleveland Institute of Arts, where he teaches courses on various aspects of the history of photography in addition to a portrait photography course. Or you might find him flipping through a photography book, contemplating ideas of how to enhance his own work.

Lately, Herb has been exploring platinum printing, a system patented in England in 1873 that creates beautiful prints that imbedded the image on the paper. It is a grueling process that takes an hour to produce one print, but its worth it when you see the results.

PHOTO: Herb Ascherman

In addition to his personal photography, Herb ran a non-profit photo gallery for 25 years, one of only two non-profit galleries in the state of Ohio. It has been temporarily closed, but Herb is planning to re-open it next year and devote half of his time to running the gallery.

Herb’s philosophy for life is simple, one day at a time, each day to the fullest, and the most good for the most people. His career in photography fulfills each prong of his philosophy.