RockHarborII2014

I ASKED ALISON about the new photo on our main wall, called Rock Harbor II 2014. We’ve printed it as a large canvas, and we just hung it for tomorrow’s opening reception, for our third show this season of Alison’s newest work. It’s such a stunning, painterly image, I’ll have to convince people that this is a photograph. This is one I’d like to hang in our own house. Here’s what she said:

“I took this shot last fall, right before teaching a workshop for the South Shore Camera Club on the Cape. I had just done tests comparing the new Nikon D810 and my old D700. Being the picky, in-search-of-high-quality person that I am, I test all of the new equipment that comes along. I’m really frugal, but whenever I find something worth the leap, I’ll be first in line with my credit card at B&H. As soon as I ascertained that the 810 produced images with much higher quality, I ordered it. My new toy arrived the day before I left for the Cape – I was like a kid in a candy shop.

In doing last-minute scouting for the workshop, I hit all of my favorite places along the Brewster flats. These days, I’m drawn to shoot images that are either all neutral, or predominantly neutral with flashes of color. So I was looking for low tide, and flat, uninteresting light – that’s the neutral backdrop. Fall is my favorite time, because the plants in the marsh have interesting, often warm-toned flashes of color. In the summer it’s all green, but in the fall, there are gorgeous color variations.

For me, this shot really tactilely feels like I loaded a paintbrush with some cadmium yellow and a little burnt sienna, and applied those brushstrokes. That’s what it looks like on the finished print, but it’s also what it felt like when I was shooting. My technique really feels like painting. I’m carefully composing the shot, and then going on instinct as I create the “camera stroke.” As with my other painterly images, the effect is entirely done in-camera. There’s no post-processing that creates the painterly feel. The D810 enables me to print larger, with amazing resolution, and captures the nuances of color that drew me to the shot.”

Our opening reception is tomorrow (Saturday, August 8th), from 5 to 7:30pm.