Biographical Note

John Figueras is a native of Rochester, New York. After Army duty in World War II, he graduated from the University of Rochester with a degree in chemistry and from the University of Illinois with a PhD in organic chemistry.  The major part of his working career was as a research chemist at Eastman Kodak, where he was engaged in a wide variety of projects: synthesis of new compounds for color films, testing of materials for heat and light stability, improvements in Kodachrome processing, preparation of photographic emulsions, and development of thin-film analytical systems. Much of this work involved computer applications; John took his first programming course in 1960 and has been involved with computers ever since. He applied the computer to studies of the relationship between color and chemical structure, development behavior of photographic emulsions, modeling of thin-film chemical systems, and interpretation and management of chemical information. 

After retiring from Kodak in 1983, he continued to work with computer applications in chemistry, resulting in several publications in the chemical literature and about eight commercially-available computer programs for chemists. He was an adjunct professor of Computer Science at the State University of New York, Geneseo, before to moving to Cape Cod in 1992.

His interest in digital photography is of fairly recent origin, stimulated by the availability a few years ago of moderately-priced inkjet printers capable of rendering images of photographic quality. His appreciation for fine photography is a gift from his father, who was a dedicated amateur photographer with a keen awareness of the importance of scene composition. John's technical background at Kodak is invaluable, with its emphasis on color theory, quality color reproduction, and the importance of image structure (graininess, sharpness and resolution).

John has had several one-man shows, the first in 2001. His work is available for purchase at the Sola and Aries East galleries in Brewster, MA, and from this website.

Top of Page