Photographic MemoriesThirty years ago I brought a simple snapshot camera with me on my first raft trip in the Grand Canyon. Once when I regretted missing a picture, a wise boatman reminded me I'd always have the moment in my Cerebro-matic. Last spring I had another chance to see the Canyon from the Colorado River, along with my camera compadre, Nancy, and her fly fisher husband, Andy. It was a tour organized for photography, and this time I brought a fancy-dancy digital outfit that filled a whole dry bag I could hardly lift. Before I show you a few of the photos that resulted, let me invite you to imagine some of what my Cerebro-matic recorded when the heavy gear wasn't handy. For instance … Desert Bighorn Sheep and their lambs foraging on the rocky riverbanks and scrubby beaches … A Canyon Wren's somersaulting song … Great Blue Herons, Ospreys, Yellow Warblers, Spotted Sandpipers, Belted Kingfishers, Black Phoebes, Ash-throated Flycatchers … The glassy emerald V at the top of a rapid in the seconds before currents collide and shatter into diamonds … Celadon light on the underside of a sandstone shelf, reflected from the water just beneath … Spindly ocotillo blooming vermilion on desert slopes … Yucca spires glowing in morning sunlight … A phalanx of barrel cactus in a row along a cliff edge straight above, each one leaning at a right angle over the river as if to watch us passing … Dry falls receding in tiers to the faraway canyon rim, stair stepping from one color-coded epoch in geology to the next … The slow reveal as we float around a bend and into the strata of another era … Ribbons of adobe-pink Zoroaster granite running through the blue-black Vishnu schist … Two billion years of Earth history in one sweeping view from the river surface toward the sky … The peace that comes with feeling utterly inconsequential. Really, all of that was enough. But since I was lugging that heavy dry bag around, I went ahead and made some pictures of rocks and stuff. You can see them here. (Also via the Chronicle tab, in the set called Grand Canyon, Spring 2022.) Enjoy the river.
At the Rim, with my brother, Bruce. Undated; possibly late Permian. Bruce's National Park Service badge, my mom's wedding ring, and my dad's Army Air Force pins came along on last spring's river trip. ChronicleOften when I return from a trip, my dear peeps want results, and I want to share the wonder I've found. But not all of my favorite pictures are destined for my official portfolio (which is, after all, for Serious Work, don't you know). Social media? I'm a conscientious objector. What to do? A solution came along when Brent Clark appeared on F-Stop Collaborate and Listen, Matt Payne's thought-provoking podcast for the nature photography community. Brent got my attention when he said he photographs for friends and family, as I do. His website of splendid work includes a section he calls Archives, comprising images he likes yet doesn’t showcase in his Collections. Following Brent’s example, I've just added a section for Fs&Fs to my own photography website (the one I published four years ago and have scarcely looked at since). I'm calling the new tab Chronicle, and the debut set of images is from my trip to Death Valley National Park in January. (Hidden message: Having a semi-private way to show photos doesn’t mean I'll start getting them out fast. Aiming for faster.) The occasion for the Death Valley visit was a workshop with Sarah Marino, Jennifer Renwick, and David Kingham, whose teaching inspired and prepared me for a few days out making pictures on my own. I felt giddy exploring the carnival of forms, textures, and colors within the relatively small part of the park I was able to reach. It was one of the most stimulating trips I’ve made, and there’s much more I’d like to do in Death Valley. Please enjoy my first scratch at the rocky, sandy, salty surface. Spider RockRising 750 feet from the floor of Canyon de Chelly, Spider Rock is as prominent in the legends of the Navajo people as it is in the northeastern Arizona landscape. The spire is said to be the home of Spider Woman, known also as Spider Grandmother, who spun the web of the universe, then gave the people the gift of weaving and taught them to create beauty in their lives through the balance of mind, body, and soul. A nurturing legacy, to be sure. But alongside the foundation stories are tales of Spider Woman carrying naughty children to the peak of the sandstone pinnacle for fatal punishment. Canyon de Chelly National Monument is on land that belongs to the Navajo nation. It is the only site that the U.S. National Park Service cooperatively manages with a tribe. About 40 Navajo families live and farm in the canyon. (Chelly is pronounced shay.) One late-March day, I came to the overlook with a friend in hope of photographing Spider Rock and the canyon walls in glowing, late afternoon light. Sudden sleet and an icy wind drove us back to the car. For some reason we didn’t drive away. Soon the squall passed and the clouds brightened, so we walked back out to the canyon’s edge. Minutes before the sun was to set, a crack opened in the clouds above the western horizon at our backs and golden light sliced across the landscape. Perhaps it was Spider Grandmother who parted the strands of clouds to reveal a moment of beauty.
© Mary Brisson, Mancos, Colorado. All rights reserved.
|
