Maine On My Mind

I’ve been planning a trip back to Maine for this summer. My first visit last year to Acadia National Park was a profound experience. I am very curious how I will perceive the area differently during a second visit.

I have been working with images I made in Maine last June  and will be printing a few to include in shows and at Artists’ Gallery in Lambertville, NJ. One of the new prints will be of the image below depicting the Margaret Todd schooner in Bar Harbor at dusk. The blues in the sky reflecting in the harbor waters served as a pleasant contrast to the warm tones of the sails. I composed to emphasize a sense of place, the rocky foreground providing grounding from which to stand and enjoy the scene.

Yea, I’m ready to go back!

The Margaret Todd, Bar Harbor, Maine

 

**********************************************************************

Warrior III – The Yoga Bird Returns

I have selected a new image to accompany Downward-facing Dog, an image of a Great Blue Heron stretching in a posture that reminded me of the famous yoga pose of the same name. This new print, which is of an image made the same morning as Downward-facing Dog, is of the same bird in yet another yoga-like posture – Warrior III. Warrior III is a more difficult position to achieve, at least for me, though this heron seemingly does it with little difficulty.

As you have probably guessed, the new print will be titled – Warrior III. Like Downward-facing Dog, I use the  reflection to create a Zen-like symmetry in the image and the overcast lighting (acting like a huge softbox) to eliminate shadow and harsh reflections. My composition does not reveal any real horizon line so the bird and it’s reflection almost seem to be floating in air. The tree limb that breaks the water’s surface and a few water bubbles are all that “ground” the bird to a terrestrial sphere.

"Warrior III"

****************************************************************

Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night…..

OK, so that’s the postman’s creed, but it’s also emotively, the conditions I like to work in visually. We haven’t had much snow around here this winter (62 F degrees yesterday!). The other day it did rain heavily and that was followed by some wonderful fog. It was a fog that kind of rolled around low to the ground and the water, changing the landscape as it moved.

What I like about rain and fog is how they change the pallete of the landscape allowing me to work with darker more saturated tones. Wet colors are vibrant and deep. The fog allows me to simplify my visual experience in the images I make. With fog in the landscape, I can isolate elements against clean, textureless, evocative backdrops, drawing the viewer’s attention to what excited me most visually. There is a sense of mystery involved for the viewer as parts of the landscape are enshrouded.

In this first image, the tree limbs seem to reach out from nothingness as fog above lake waters obscures their trunks and the ground. It is an image that seems the reverse of what we would expect to see which enhances its sense of mystery.

(c) 2012 Paul Grecian - http://www.paulgrecianphoto.com

 

In this second image (part of my “pathways” series), I use the fog to obscure the end of the path which not only simplifies the image visually but adds a good deal of suspense to the piece. Sometimes I like having the viewer need to finish the “story”. I also like sensual lines, in this case both the foreground tree on the left and the curves of the path itself both contribute and offer contrast to the otherwise straight lines of the woods. Compositionally, I use the foreground tree to point the way up the path as well.

 

(c) 2012 Paul Grecian - http://www.paulgrecianphoto.com