19 Nov Shadows in the Meadow

I started taking pictures in the meadow because my friend Cait, who also lives along it, asked me to make images for her mother.  When I began to shoot, the meadow was filled with color and life.  I liked some of the images I was making but it took me a while to find my footing.  Just as fall began to appear, so did some massive mowers.  The tall wavy grasses of the pasture were reduced to a scraggly ripped up mess.  The pathway was littered with small dead rodents that had been either hit by the mowers, or grabbed by the hawks which had a field day hunting in the fields that were cleared of their ground cover.

With the meadow filled with vibrant plant life I was found it difficult to find a point of focus.  However as the seasons changed I started to notice new things each day.  When I took pictures of the ripe milkweed I was a bit bored.  However, when they opened up and began to fill with milkweed bugs things began to get more interesting.  Over the next two months, as I adjusted to life in North Carolina, I began to shoot almost everyday after I dropped off my kids for school.  I started to notice new things every few days.  After I had shot the milkweed to death I spotted the vines.  Then I began to focus on other plants.

This morning I noticed that the shadow of a leaf looked like an elephant.

I was on a walk with my wife so I rushed to shoot it, but then I noticed that another one looked like a dinosaur.

After that I told her to go on by herself and I played with the leaves for the next half hour.  For me the meadow walks are as much about re-learning to pay attention to the things that I normally miss.  For a few days I will notice things and move on.  I am sure that for a while I will be obsessed with the way the sun hits these leaves on the ground.  I spotted a cowboy on a horse.

Then a cat playing with string

Then a woman walking her dog

And a dog

and several other odd shapes that our imaginations can run with.

As I hurried back home to get to work I thought about the shadows I would find later that day, or in the morning.  This work isn’t about changing the world, but it about changing the way that I exist in the world.