25-JUL-2015
Seaform by Dale Chihuly, Corning Museum of Glass, Corning, New York, 2015
This museum owns many Chihuly pieces, including this stunning example from his “Seaform” series. He started this series in the 1980s, creating transparent sculptures of thin glass, strengthened by ribbed strands of color. The glass fish nestled within this elegant bowl glow with a startling luminosity. I increase the luminosity by spot metering and underexposing the image, darkening the edges all around the frame to underscore my own interpretation of another artists work.
27-JUL-2015
Red carpet welcome, The Athenaeum, Chautauqua, New York, 2015
I concluded my journey through Western New York State with a weeklong sojourn at the Chautauqua Institute, enjoying lectures and performances in both the arts and social issues. We received a red carpet welcome at Chautauqua’s most historic hotel, The Athenaeum. I photographed its entrance with a wideangle lens just after dawn, just as a rising sun illuminated the hotel’s name on the entrance carpet.
27-JUL-2015
Living history, The Athenaeum, Chautauqua, New York, 2015
The front desk at Chautauqua’s largest and oldest hotel is original, and so is the hotel’s nameplate set into its counter. I moved in on it to stress the hotel’s 1881 founding date. The materials in this image express the workmanship of the 19th century. The nameplate is brass, while the desk is made of solid oak or maple.
29-JUL-2015
Wood reigns, The Athenaeum, Chautauqua, New York, 2015
The 160-room Athenaeum Hotel is said to be the largest wooden building in the Eastern United States. It is also said to be among the first hotels to install electric lights. At one point, Chautauqua boasted more than 20 full service resort hotels, but all of them are now gone except for the Athenaeum. I photographed its exterior just after dawn, as the morning light illuminated its famous front veranda. I framed the scene through the vertical trees on either side, which echo the upward thrust of the hotel’s Victorian architecture.
27-JUL-2015
Lobby, The Athenaeum, Chautauqua, New York, 2015
Chautauqua, founded in 1874 by inventor Lewis Miller and Methodist Bishop John Vincent, was originally a teaching camp for Sunday school teachers. Framed photographs of these founders still hang in the Athenaeum’s lobby. I also included one of the lobby’s vintage couches in the image. Along with the ornate decoration provided by the lobby wallpaper, the softly textured couch symbolizes the hotel’s tradition of elegance, hospitality and comfort.
27-JUL-2015
Sweeper, The Athenaeum, Chautauqua, New York, 2015
On this morning, a heavy fog rolled in off Lake Chautauqua. It provides a magical background for this image of a hotel employee readying the hotel’s lovely veranda for the day’s activities.
30-JUL-2015
Morning coffee, The Athenaeum, Chautauqua, New York, 2015
One of the hotel’s original lobby fireplaces provides the backdrop for an early morning cup of coffee. This woman is one of several thousand participants that will be attending cultural and artistic programs on the 750-acre Chautauqua campus during the day to come.
30-JUL-2015
Planning the day, The Athenaeum, Chautauqua, New York, 2015
The Chautauquan Daily is the official newspaper of the Chautauqua Institution. The newspaper began in 1876, two years after Chautauqua’s founding. It has continuously served Chautauqua with information about each day’s events. College interns work as its reporters, photographers, editors and designers, along with freelancers and retired journalists. Chautauqua attendees find the paper an essential guide to the vast range of events offered every day during the season. The participants in this photograph are literally burying themselves in the paper as they plan their day.
28-JUL-2015
Early risers, The Athenaeum, Chautauqua, New York, 2015
The massive dining room, designed to serve hundreds of guests, dwarfs these early breakfasters. I use incongruity and atmospheric morning light to create a sense of both scale and atmosphere.
29-JUL-2015
Personal service, The Athenaeum, Chautauqua, New York, 2015
The hotel’s restaurant staff must meet the challenge of satisfying huge numbers of diners within very short periods of time. The diners are usually on a tight time schedule as they attend cultural lectures every morning and afternoon, and musical, dance, theatre, and operatic performances every evening. In this image, I express the patience and diligence of a staffer as she takes an order from a program participant.
28-JUL-2015
Remembering the bats, The Athenaeum, Chautauqua, New York, 2015
When the Athenaeum Hotel was opened in 1881, there were more than 10,000 brown bats on Chautauqua’s grounds. They were so much part of Chautauqua’s culture that even the wooden fences around the hotel’s porches were decorated with cutouts shaped like bats. Today, only a few bats are left – usually only one is seen at a time, dipping and weaving over Chautauqua Lake in the evening. The reason: a disease called WNS – White Nose Syndrome, which has reduced New York state’s brown bat population by 90 per cent. Some bat populations are surviving, but extinction is a definite possibility. In any event, Chautauqua’s bats will always be remembered, as long as the Athenaeum’s porch fences remain. In this image I include three of those bat cutouts, their pointed wings rhythmically repeated by the yellow flower petals that rise towards them.
30-JUL-2015
Splashes, The Athenaeum, Chautauqua, New York, 2015
The hotel’s 135-year old central fountain stands at the base of its veranda. Using a 1/950th of a second shutter speed, I was able to change its flow from a flow to a splash. The individual droplets become visible as they rise and fall, creating a view of the fountain that could never be seen in the late 19th or early 20th century.