About Steve Stober

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Widely recognized for his strikingly beautiful black and white portraits, Steve Stober has been operating a successful Toronto studio for over twenty years. It is Stober's natural ability to relate to people both young and old that make his sittings unique and sought after by an appreciative and discriminating clientele. Steve Stober's portraits are honest representations of his subjects. They are reflections of the artist at work, a personal depiction of a moment, an expression of the strength of character, of the resolve of human spirit, of timeless beauty recognized by the photographer's eye.

The black and white medium has always been the ultimate expression of art in photography. For archival purposes, a fibre base silver gelatin print has been proven to outlast a digital print for generations to come. As heirlooms and as works of art, silver gelatin prints hold as true today as they did one hundred years ago. Black and white portraiture conveys a breathtaking simplicity in tonal range and subject matter. Steve Stober is one of the few portraitists who offers the choice of sittings shot either on film or digitally and remains committed to the fine art form of hand-printing his film-based work in a traditional darkroom. All Steve Stober's signed display portraits are fibre base, museum quality silver gelatin prints.

Steve Stober has been a photographer all his life. Born and raised in Montreal in 1955, he was inspired at an early age by the vibrancy of the city and its people. At the age of 13, he started processing and printing his own negatives in a darkroom his father had built for him. At the age of 16, he was shooting with his father’s Rolleiflex camera. By the time he was 22, he had already worked as a staff photographer on two college student newspapers and had seen his work published regularly. In 1980, he moved to Toronto in order to establish a studio.

He has been at his present location for over ten years. He has participated in numerous group shows and has had several solo exhibits which continue to challenge him through a wide body of personal work. A 2009 exhibition of his was praised by The Toronto Star's art critic as "one of the most important and mesmerizing shows in Toronto in the last five years or more". He has published books on yoga, drumming, body issues and several portfolios as well. He travels extensively and in 2008 was invited to give a lecture on his work at the Fototeca de Cuba in Havana, Cuba.

On a personal note, Steve Stober works regularly with members of Toronto's vibrant arts community by photographing actors, dancers and musicians at artist-friendly rates. He is a long-standing yoga practitioner and drummer and the proud father of two grown sons.