✶   HISTORY, REIMAGINED BY HAND   ✶

Melvin Hale, Ph.D.

An artist, researcher, and lifelong collector of the visual evidence of time.

Art from the archive, made present.

Hale began collecting vintage prints and photographs around 2005. In 2006, after opening a gift shop in Palm Springs, he began selling colorized historic photographs and found a way to bring a different kind of presence to old images.

His work centers on real photo postcards, street scenes, and images of American life from the 1930s through the 1950s. A doctoral degree from UCLA in Information Studies gave his visual practice a deeper research framework.

Read about the process
Melvin Hale conducting research in the UCLA Archives
Filming the Roar of the MGM Lion 1929
“I seek to peel back the tarnished and soiled evidence of time from these treasured artifacts, add color, and watch them come to life.”
Melvin Hale