Water & Sky: Dance
Artist Statement
This is the age in which spectacular photos – “the 100 best landscape photos of the year” – arrive as forwards in our inboxes, or grace our computer desktops and screensavers, or entice us in other media. And spectacular images they are: exotic environments, stunning landforms, shown in brilliant, saturated colours. They take our breath away with their beauty; they stir us up, our hearts beat faster, we long to see more of the world than our own backyards.
Being inundated with such images also conditions our expectations of what constitutes natural beauty and what a beautiful landscape photograph should look like. It becomes harder to notice the beauty in the ordinary, in what we see every day.
For several years, I have been entranced by the interplay of water and sky – the contrast of their textures and shapes, the interaction of their colours, their ephemeral dance together. I am struck by their vastness. They seem almost like entities that live, breathe, move and change; huge, present, indifferent. Noticing is essential: when I’m graced enough to see, they divulge sights that arrest my eyes and soothe my soul.
There are spectacular sunrises and sunsets, to be sure, but my eye prefers the subtle beauty in more subdued moments, after the glory has passed or when there is no glory at all, only nuanced shapes, colours and textures.
The images in this exhibition were taken in locales I frequent regularly, in my own back yard so to speak. These photographs are intended to be contemplative; to make you pause, to slow your heartbeat, to invite you to look closer for all that each photo contains. Such is the natural beauty of the world around us; we do not need to go to exotic locales to find it, we need only notice what we see right before us.
Biography
Catherine Constable became a New Brunswicker by choice in 2009. In retirement, she became an artist by choice by obtaining a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Nova Scotia College of Arts and Design University. So far, she is a photographer, painter, relief printmaker and maker of handmade books. The best is yet to come.