These images are made by using a second camera to photograph the
ground-glass of an 8x10 view-camera, without the standard bellows
attached; they are all taken from the same vantage point within the
Olana Viewshed, a protected area within the sight-line from Olana, the
former estate of American landscape painter Frederic Church. While
the camera’s lens-generated view is legible, the ‘wash’ of colors and
shadows cast from trees and the front standard create abstract
elements on the ground glass. During Olana’s construction, Church was
obsessed with its eclectic ornamentation. Towards the end of his
life, he shifted his focus to the reconfiguration of the view from his
estate, through extensive land excavation and husbandry. The
culmination of Church’s efforts was his last great work: The view from
Olana. Though less involved in painting throughout four-decade
construction of the estate, Church obsessively documented the view
from the house through pencil sketches, annotated with color charts
documenting the variances in color, hue and luminance throughout the
seasons. In much the same vein, I see these images not as
representational bucolic landscapes, but instead sketches of a
visceral view, combining the landscape’s shift in color temperature
and luminosity in flux with the actual content upon which the camera
is pointed.