“September Meadow”

Late September and early October in northeast Ohio are warm in hue … landscapes changing subtly each day.  Summer’s decedents, some lost in shadow, others flame. Field grasses disappearing in the moment; ironweed, goldenrod slowly burning until extinguished.

Seed-heads across Squire Valleevue Farm stand in relief against a background of goldenrod, asters and late meadow grasses, many verdant until a frost.

Autumn brings to mind the last stanza of Robert Frost’s poem “Reluctance”

“Rails into Autumn”

This is the scene I’ve walked into for sixty years. An arching pin oak or two have passed since my childhood but new ones rise. What has never changed are the rails, rails that take me into each season, ones that orient me through snow, morning fog, autumn hues and a lifetime of magenta mornings and afternoon shadows.

” … to hatch a crow, a black rainbow … ”  E.J. Hughes

Perhaps no one more than the poet, Ted Hughes, vested meaning and metaphor in the crow. For me, crows have been the source of childhood memories and are as beautiful and mysterious as black rainbows. Tender and cruel and brilliant, they carry their own shadow.

Yesterday (March 20) I saw a good dozen in singles and pairs returning to the Chagrin Valley, presumably their rookery along the river’s escarpment. By the end of the month small flocks will arrive to begin the mating and battle rituals. And by the first of May nests will fill with black rainbows.

Outbuilding, Leelanau County, MI

“Outbuilding, Leelanau County, Michigan”

After printing this image I tried to imagine whether the scene would have appealed to three of my favorite artists, Edward Hopper, Grant Wood and Andrew Wyeth, each whose work may be considered an example of modern American realism. I think the almost surreal landscape would have attracted Wyeth; the nostalgic throwback, Wood; and the solitude of the scene, (especially the isolation of the towering outbuilding), Hopper. I mention these artists because, for many years I’ve been drawn to their work and suspect it has influenced the way I see landscapes and architecture.

This outbuilding resides on the property of Carsten Burfiend, the first settler of Leelanau County.  Mr. Burfiend built two farms in the late 19th century just north of Glen Arbor. The farm is closed though restored and sits between a spine of dunes to the east and Lake Michigan less than a mile west.

Rolling Mill, West Side Cuyahoga

Early February provided a perfect day to photograph smoke stacks at the former J&L Steel melt shop and rolling mill on the west side of the Cuyahoga river. Purchased from “Otis Steel”, J&L’s mill was home to thousands of steelworkers and millwrights since 1942. Over several generations the facility has been through numerous incarnations, the most recent of which was its acquisition by LTV Corp. (a consolidation with Republic Steel in 1984), a shutdown in 2002 pursuant to ISG’s purchase and finally the eventual acquisition by Luxembourg-based ArcelorMittal and the mill’s reopening in 2004.

The billowing “smoke” animating the image is really only steam as the morning’s low air temperature (-10°) created ideal conditions for condensation. The shot reminded me a little of a Braque or Picasso Cubist painting … each of the pieces reassembled, seemingly creating more than the sum of its parts. There is something ironically anthropomorphic about the structure with its jaws turned skyward and hot breath billowing in successive bursts. I resisted the temptation to include the sprawling length of the mill in a landscape format. And finally, rather than producing this as a black and white image, which would have reduced the image to a study in “shapes,” I retained the colors to add tonality and dimension.