HDR Photography
Friday marked the end of exams, and students and faculty alike celebrated by checking canoes and kayaks out of this little boat house on St. Lawrence’s campus. (If it’s true that our school resembles a ski resort in the winter, it also resembles a summer camp during the warmer months of the year.) Nothing really says the year is done (and grading with it) like floating along in complete relaxation.
Continuing this week of “end of the school year,” calming-of-the-campus photographs is this landscape over the quad: An ocean of light and shadow (pardon the cliché) divides the new Kirk Douglass Hall (a.k.a. “the new dorm”) from the rememberer.
The end of the school year (with the mixed feelings I discussed in my last post) has arrived, so I’ve decided to dedicate this week and next to documenting the feeling of a college campus as it quiets down for the summer. When it comes time to eject from the campus bubble and head out, is there any vehicle that captures the vibe of the northeastern college student better than a rusty, ski-rack-enhanced old Saab?
The first image, with its sunset and tempting road in the background, might have been all I needed to capture the vibe of this particular Swedish sleeper, but I didn’t want to let it go without documenting the worn bumper stickers dotting the back: stickers from another school (an older sibling, or the original owner?), the current school (SPORTS!), and an assortment of ski resorts.
The end of the school year has finally arrived (I’m proctoring a final as we speak), and that leads to a lot of complicated emotions for graduating seniors: relief, regret, nostalgia, hope, etc. In a disused utility stairwell between a loading dock and a backstage prep area, I found this charming little shrine/still life. In the context of the space and the moment, I can’t begin to imagine what kind of meaning this structure contains. There’s a lovely symmetry though, isn’t there?
In the fall of 2013 at St. Lawrence University (on Parents’ Weekend, no less!), the gorgeous old copper steeple of Gunnison Memorial Chapel burned down from an electrical fire. Renovations and repairs are finally done, and the new copper steeple was delivered yesterday. Today, it will be hoisted up and returned to the top of the repaired bell tower, but last night I paid it a visit during the blue hour to get a feeling for the scale of the structure.
The smokies in the spring really are quite spectacular.
Riders are the stars of the show (in this case, the Kentucky Summer Classic), but I love to see the way the natural form of horse and rider fit into the lines and structures, tents and fences, of the grounds. Where do the spectators, trainers, grooms (and photographers) fit into that equation? Are we also a part of the horse show structure?
I was not prepared for snow during my first winter in the south!
On a day much like today, ready for rain but without any guarantees, a hint of blue sky is an eyeball magnet.
Standing on the thick ice of the Rideau Canal in the winter, in the same place where I could be underwater in the summer and in view of the Capital, makes for quite the juxtaposition.
There is something very dramatic about the rocky beaches around the San Francisco bay area.
There’s an elegant symmetry to the bars and netting against the larger, wooden structure of Appleton Arena (home of the Skating Saints).
Spring is in the air in the Smokies and the rivers are flowing.
I swear that this shot is a candid: no posing or planning went into the moment. A little image of American aristocracy, expressed as Anglophilia: the thick hedge, the English riding garb, the friendly pony ears, the quiet attention. The cover of some future magazine, perhaps?
From the human-scale intimacy of family life yesterday, I wanted to contrast at the other extreme: the irrigation-induced circles of the central United States in an otherwise barren landscape. Particularly as spring (and photosynthetic life) begin to dominate the countryside, I wanted to reflect on the role of humans in that transformation.
Decaseconds 