Steve Weiss

Steve Weiss is a Phoenix native of the worst kind, the kind that prattles on endlessly about the good old days when there was nothing North of Camelback Road and folks rode horseback through the neighborhood on the way to the desert.

Exposed to photography in high school, he only complicated matters by attending the San Francisco Art Institute and Arizona State University, getting a B.F.A. in 1978 that taught him the difference between the "winkin'" eye" and the "shootin' eye".

In 1980, he began his fine art photography company Candid Landscapes, with the intention of looking at the natural and urban scene with a fresh and uncontrived approach. Corporate and private clients collect his photographs, using traditional methods of archival black and white and color photography, as well as unconventional Polaroid landscapes.

His work is in the fine art collections of Del Webb Corporation, Salt River Project and the Gallagher Kennedy law firm, and he received the Phoenix Art Museum Contemporary Forum Artist Materials Grant in 2001.

In 1989, Weiss began location scouting and location managing for TV commercials, still photography shoots and feature films. Going to unique locations for the scouting work has brought him to great places for fine art photography, and vice versa.

Since 2002, he has coordinated microcinema screenings of shorts and feature films under the umbrella organization "No Festival Required". His community service includes being a member of the Tovrea Castle Advisory Committee, Downtown Phoenix Arts Coalition, spokesperson for the Downtown Voices Coalition and a board member of the Arizona Production Association.