#Flowers

“Landscape is nearly always present in one way or another in my work. Perhaps the key here is the triple meaning of “landscape”, a type of picture, a type of view and a type of place. The three cannot really be separated. The experience of a place is shaped in advance by our experience of images of it and of related places. It is easy to realize this but coming to terms with the profound implication of it can take a long time. It is a moving dynamic."

~ Anastasia Samoylova

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"Photography is so connected to time, its our currency"

 

~ Cig Harvey

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"The qualities that have fascinated me and led me to make a particular photograph are usually quite intuitive. I generally don't have a completed concept in my mind when I begin--I move things around, change angles, lighting - until everything seems right."

 

~ Brigitte Carnochan

 

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“I photograph out of love to record beautiful forms. It’s a way of life, a compulsion. There is nothing I would rather do.”

 

~ Brett Weston

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“When I’m not making work, I’m spending my time reading. I’m reading and thinking about how to present something in a different way visually or through words”

 

~ Cig Harvey

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“In my artistic process I have tried to create images that invite the observer to examine by means of what I call “emotional contemplation” assigning through the beauty in them the meaning of their shape”

 

~ Luis González Palma

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“Earth laughs in flowers.”

~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Nature doesn’t wait for anyone”

~ Cig Harvey

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“Nature doesn’t wait for anyone”

~ Cig Harvey

"The essence of my work really is about the little moments of wonder in life"

 

~ Paul Cupido

“Adams feels deeply what he sees, he has a reverence for the earth in all its variety, delicacy and strength, but he is the absolute reverse of effusive: he sees with such austerity, even severity, that some have mistakenly called him cold. He has an incomparable technical expertness in communicating what he sees and feels, and for half a century and more he has gone on making photographs so plainly stamped with his personal artistry that they hardly need his steeple-A signature on them. They have taught thousands how to see: they have become household images, they have steadily affirmed life.”~ Wallace Stegner

“In many ways I'm drawn to the natural world because of the cycle of life and the ephemeral nature of flowers and their beauty, meaning that you have to be present right now” 

~ Cig Harvey

“It is a scientistic fact that color affects the body"

 

~ Cig Harvey

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“At first, I looked questionably at the field weeds and stems stuck into a vase, but on further scanning of the back ground, I became enamored of the pane of glass dappled with raindrops and misty patches of light. I was taken with how beautifully dark and light were splashed throughout the image and how easily the stems and dry flowers graced the vase. Taken as a whole, this photo meets the eye as an overall texture rather than as neatly grouped elements with a frame. Were it not for some of the parts showing how crisply they can be delineated by the camera lens, I would describe this photograph as being gently impressionistic."

 

~ Paul Caponigro

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"I gravitate towards places where humans have been and are no more, to the edge of man’s influence, where the elements are taking over or covering man’s traces."

 

~ Michael Kenna

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"Keep your face to the sunshine and you cannot see the shadow. It's what sunflowers do."

 

~ Helen Keller

“If you wait, people will forget your camera and the soul will drift up into view.”

 

~ Steve McCurry

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“Adams feels deeply what he sees, he has a reverence for the earth in all its variety, delicacy and strength, but he is the absolute reverse of effusive: he sees with such austerity, even severity, that some have mistakenly called him cold. He has an incomparable technical expertness in communicating what he sees and feels, and for half a century and more he has gone on making photographs so plainly stamped with his personal artistry that they hardly need his steeple-A signature on them. They have taught thousands how to see: they have become household images, they have steadily affirmed life.”

 

~ Wallace Stegner

(1909-1993)

 

“I had a fine north-light window in my San Francisco home which gave beautiful illumination, especially on foggy days. My mother had proudly brought me a large, pale pink rose from our garden and I immediately wanted to photograph it. The north light from the window was marvelous for the translucent petals of the rosebud. I could not find an appropriate background. Everything I tried, bowls, pillows, stacked books and so on was unsatisfactory. I finally remembered a piece of weathered plywood picked up at nearby Baker Beach as wave - worn driftwood. Two pillows on a table supported the wood at the right height under the window and the rose rested comfortably upon it. The relationship of the plywood design to the petal shapes was fortunate and I lost no time completing the picture “

 

~ Ansel Adams
(1902-1984)

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"This is work. My work contains everything I love. It is all in each photograph. No darkness. No despair. No evil. No fear. Love chooses the settings. Love chooses the props. It is both the myth and the reality of my existence. My life on earth, to share. At the same time, it is a document and an homage to all that has inspired me."

~ Sheila Metzner

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We are looking forward to the opening of “The Power of Photography” exhibition at the Bowers Museum this Saturday! This exhibition will feature a selection of over 70 original prints curated by collector and gallerist Peter Fetterman, on view October 7th, 2023 to January 14th 2024. The museum will also be hosting a number of events around the exhibition including a lecture and book signing by Peter Fetterman on October 7th at the Bowers Museum. To attend the event online or at the museum please see below for tickets and more information.

“Though flaunting its charm by the light of day, the flower seems to have been hiding an aspect of it’s deeper interior as I studied it on my camera’s ground glass. Having photographed and studied the sunflower in many of its growing aspects, I was intrigued with the images presented in its process of drying and dying. Beauty always attended its outer aspects in life, whereas the folding up of the dying petals gave images a more interior and reflective stance, like that taught by the mystics”

~ Paul Caponigro

“In the late 1990’s, I was afflicted with knee problems and had both knees replaced. The surgery was not that difficult, but therapy and exercise did prove to be tedious. As a result, I found it most difficult to heft my 5 x 7 view camera into the field along with the weighty tripod required. It then occurred to me that I could make photographs indoors as well as in the great outdoors. In the field, I often had found sticks, stones and bones that were interesting enough to enjoy in my home, and I began to look at them now as potential subjects for photographs. It was the beginning of a long period of trying to arrange objects well enough to avoid a stilted look. Nature always had her way of presenting her creations with grace and beauty, even within seemingly chaotic views”

 

~ Paul Caponigro

“I travelled to Laos at the behest of the photographer Kenro Izu to make photographs which could be used and auctioned to raise funds for his Children’s Hospital there. Over the space of ten days, I photographed Buddhist Temples, the Mekong River and various mountains, trees, and landscapes of this delightfully hospitable country.
Whilst I stayed in Luang Prabang, I would walk from my hotel into town each evening to find something to eat for dinner. One night, on my way home I came across a pond with lotus flowers, closed and asleep for the night. The next morning I was there early to photograph these gorgeous white flowers as they lay open, floating on the water’s surface. This lotus flower was particularly appealing and starkly beautiful: hence I referenced my wife Mamta in the title. A year or so later, somebody kindly pointed out to me that the flower was not a lotus but a water lily!

Apparently, lotus flowers hover six inches above the water, water lilies float. Fortunately, I have an understanding wife and we decided together that it was too late to change the title to Mamta’s Water Lily. What’s in a name anyway!”

 

~ Michael Kenna

“If we feel more, I feel we will have more compassion. I use all of the formal devices that I have as an artist to ask, ‘How can I get you to look? How can I get you to live more?” 

 

~ Cig Harvey

“Tears fell from my eyes when I saw the first two prints. I said, "Mr. Fresson, I'm going to be working with you for a long time."

 

~ Sheila Metzner

"Sometimes you walk a very thin line as an artist. It’s dangerous. You have to let yourself go, but not too far. "

~ William Gilles

"Well, if it stays with you—over time—it has a certain power, right? I think there are so many things about a photograph that might make it “great.” "

~ Brigitte Carnochan

"Taking pictures is savoring life intensely, every hundredth of a second."

 

~ Marc Riboud

“I want my photographs to be sensory, like edible flowers, a visual taste. Color and flowers act as symbol and metaphor to access our senses,”

~ Cig Harvey

"Photography is still the most basic form of magic. Caught in my "box of darkness", the image becomes immortal."

~ Shelia Metzner

“I was aiming for the rich details and opulent compositions of the Dutch and Flemish Golden Age painters. But soon I discovered it was just too much information. I wanted something simpler — to focus on a specific theme and develop a style.”

~ Ron Van Dongen

“If you see a tree as blue, then make it blue.”

~ Paul Gauguin
(1848 - 1903)

"The qualities that have fascinated me and led me to make a particular photograph are usually quite intuitive. I generally don't have a completed concept in my mind when I begin--I move things around, change angles, lighting - until everything seems right."

 

~ Brigitte Carnochan

We are happy to join with our esteemed colleagues at LA Louver (Venice, CA) to celebrate this summer the beauty and power of botanicals in our two exhibitions, The Flower Show.

“If you look the right way, you can see the whole world is a garden"

~ Frances Hodgson Burnett
(1849-1924)

"Photography always just gives, it never takes away"

~ Cig Harvey

“I’m quite happy with my pictures. I’ve been co-habitant with them for years now and we know each other inside out. So I feel I’m entitled to say that pictures have a life and a character of their own. Maybe they’re like plants, they won’t really flourish unless you talk to them"

~ Robert Doisneau
(1912-1994)

“There were about 100 people who ran the 1960’s in England and I was fortunate enough to meet, work with and/or photograph virtually all of them”

~ Robert Whitaker

“Love is the flower you’ve got to let grow”

~ John Lennon

“The Sonoran Desert bloom is a magical time for us in this area. Thanks to the winter rains, brown and arid is replaced with a magnificent array of colors, with flowers popping up seemingly overnight. Cactus flowers in particular are the greatest gift. After hibernating and saving up their energy during the cold months, the mother cactus plant releases a display of hues and tones that one would think come from another world. This hand colored print serves as tribute to all the colors of prickly pear cactus you see around the desert during this blooming period.”

“There is something instinctive about the moment you choose to “take” a photograph. It’s not the result of thought or reflection.The strength of the composition is always born of the instinct of the decision. It reminds me of archery. There is the tension of the bow and the free flight of the arrow”

~ Edouard Boubat
(1923 - 1999)

How to Force Blossoms

1. Acknowledge out loud your desperation for spring.

2. Find branches with plenty of buds on them.

3. Cut the stems at an angle.

4. Arrange in warm water.

5. Change the water daily.

6. Place in indirect sunlight all over the house.

7. Wait.

Warning — Forcing forsythia may cause a temporary aversion to violet, its opposite on the color spectrum.

~Cig Harvey