January 2014
Artist’s Statement
I have always been fascinated by old, abandoned buildings in various states of decay or evolution, and drawn by coastal landscapes. These first 4 photos were shot in Apalachicola, FL – the heart of Florida’s oyster country, a coastal town struggling to survive in the midst of industrial decay and the effects of pollution and climate change on the gulf coast, surrounded by the natural beauty of the coastal rivers and marshes.
Biography
I have been taking photos since the 1980s, when I inherited my first Canon SLR, a cast-off from my father. I am self-taught, but have learned from looking at great photography since childhood, beginning with a well-worn copy of The Family of Man on my parents’ bookshelves. My love of photography has always been closely tied to my love of travel and observing other places and the people who live there, beginning with photos I took in the 1980s with that first camera – of Nicaragua and Burkina Faso, and the revolutionary changes transforming those countries at the time. Since then I have traveled in British Columbia, Nova Scotia, France, Spain, Italy, Quebec, Costa Rica, and Puerto Rico. But I have also fallen in love with the fascinating regions lying within our own borders: New England, New Mexico, and closer to home, Louisiana and the gulf coast region of Florida near Apalachicola.
My photos have appeared in several books, and in LensWork online. I have exhibited at the Arts Clayton Gallery, the Norton Arts Center (in Hapeville, GA, where I live), Oakland Cemetery, and other events during the past several years of Atlanta Celebrates Photography month. I moved to Atlanta in 1989 from Maryland, live in Hapeville with my husband and cat, and work in the clinical laboratory at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta.
