The American West

We put Santa Fe in our review mirror and headed into the great expanse of the American West. We drove all day and into the night arriving under a blanket of darkness to Monument Valley where I reflected the next morning: 

Sunrise over Monument Valley… I arrived in the night, black on black the monuments rose in a silhouette of stars. Sleeping monsters hiding in the dark. I felt small in the shadow of that mighty fame. As dawn emerged from beyond the endless horizon I became a weightless feather riding on the back of an eagle in the hallways of the valleys between, together waiting for the sun. They say Native Americans believed everything has a soul and as I look out on this vast and strange place I can’t help but feel these formations have memories and wisdom and are looking back at us just as we are of them. What do we have to say that could possibly compare to all that the monuments hold?….

At Monument Valley we stayed at The View. The rooms are nothing to write home about (life hack: I always travel with a scented candle to help elevate hotel rooms) but it was all about waking up to the sun rising from the balcony of your room with the most incredible view. If I ever find myself back at Monument Valley I would do an early morning or early evening horseback ride through the monuments to experience the nature up close since you are not allowed to venture off the designated road in your car. The below image of me looking out over Monument Valley is taken by the freestanding boulders to the left of the visitor’s center as you head toward the entrance to drive down into the valley. 

We then continued west to Horseshoe Bend which is an easy pull-off the main road and requires no admission fees. It is a 10-15 minute hike to the bend (just FYI) and can be very crowded at sunset but still totally worth it. 

The next morning I wanted to photograph Antelope Canyon which you must make a reservation for and is actually quite expensive. I opted for the photographer’s tour which was about two hours in total. Being that it was winter there only ended up being two of us with a guide who takes you through the canyon and points out some of the best photographic spots and helps clear people on other tours out of your frame. Some very important facts to know about this: the canyons are narrow and VERY crowded. There are multiple tour groups at a time and can be claustrophobic. However, if you are on the photographer’s tour you will have opportunities to shoot in empty spots as they occur with the help of your guide. Also very important to note, you must have a DSLR type camera (not just an iPhone or point and shoot) AND a tripod. They will not allow you to take the tour without these two elements nor let persons you are traveling with to accompany you if they do not also have their own gear. I personally think these rules are ridiculous but that is the way it is. I am so glad I did the tour and I’m happy with my shots, however, I would not do it again as the experience is stressful. I photographed Upper Canyon, Lower Canyon was closed, but from my understanding Upper Canyon is more photogenic. Additionally, if you want the famous light beams you must visit during summer and request that time slot. 

Then it was off to the Grand Canyon. We stayed at the El Tovar Hotel right in the center of it all which was great for easy access to sunrise and sunset views. Being that it was winter and quite cold, the hotel’s lodge-like atmosphere with burning fireplaces felt cozy and the restaurant, which you will need reservations for, had organic seasonal options.

It has always been a dream of mine to do this road trip across America and I cherish these memories. There were long stretches of not much to see, there were at times never ending urban sprawl but then there was magic. As the time between now and then separates the highlights float to the top and it was really just a relaxing way to travel that slowly without a real plan and opening ourselves to discovery.

The road trip came about because I hadn’t been home in so long I had many places I needed to visit. The thought of overpaying during holiday season to fly from city to city for weeks in cramped airplanes with no personal space and being treated poorly was too distressful a thought. I’m so sick of people going through my luggage, patting me down, taking apart my camera bag, and fighting for overhead space. So I hatched this idea to just drive. From coast to coast, sea to shinning sea. The only problem was … highways terrify me. The only way I’d do it is in one of the safest cars on the road, a Volvo XC60. I know a lot about Volvos. I did a road trip through Sweden in the XC90 a couple of years ago. I shot a collection of Volvo’s over the decades for their 60th anniversary out in L.A. and Palm Springs and even on top of Griffith Observatory! But this was different, this was personal and with that, in our XC60, starting in Savannah, Georgia, we took off

Review of the Volvo XC60 (this is not paid for, btw, I just love this brand / vehicle)

We came across all weather conditions on this journey from hot and sunny to 2 degrees and snowy. I always felt safe, first and foremost. The vehicle is quiet, and the sound system is so good. We listened to music, to audio books, to my favorite daily podcast. I can also say without hesitation because now I know after weeks of being in this vehicle, the seats are the most comfortable. I’ve been in a few cars since and nothing compares in comfort. The drive is smooth, you feel removed from the road and as passenger I greatly appreciate this. It has all the safety features from the cameras to little lights on the mirrors when a car is in your blind spot. It can assist you in parallel parking, it can drive assist for you down the highway which is amazing when you’re looking at a flat, straight 8 hour highway in western Kansas. It will stop you if you are about to run into something or someone. Seat warmers were life savers and the car in general heats up really quickly. OHHHH, but perhaps my favorite feature was the ability to pre-condition the car while it’s plugged in. Meaning, if my yoga class was at 5pm I could schedule the car to pre-heat while plugged into the house at 4:30pm so my ride to class in the snow was not freezing. Speaking of plugging in, being a hybrid we could charge it at home and at certain charging stations in museums, concert halls, and even grocery stores making the vehicle super green. The iPad sized display was beautiful and easy to use. The entire top of the car is a sunroof if you want. It was all just really awesome. I don’t think I would have enjoyed the journey so much in any other car… probably because I would be sure every eighteen-wheeler we passed (which was A LOT) was about to kill us. The Volvo protected us from the fear, the sounds, the size of things on the road that would typically give me anxiety. The car is also just so smart, it felt like its own little character as part of our trip. 

Below are some of those highlights I mentioned earlier from discovering the American West. 

Provence – A New Chapter

Sunset vista from the small Provencal town of Bonnieux, France

I travel a lot. Typically, I feel very safe. I find that most people around the world all want the same things: peace, love, freedom. I’ve traveled so much and so far now I’m good at keeping anxieties down, especially irrational ones.

That was until a recent flight back from Sweden.

There were two gentlemen boarding the plane acting very strangely and it struck me… what if they wanted to hurt the people on board. After a mild panic attack and contemplating being that girl who throws a big fuss and wants off the plane, I realized something important. The first thing that came into my head after I thought “Damn it, I’m on a plane with terrorists!” was “…and now I’ll never know what it was like to live in France.” So I made myself a promise. I said, if this is not a terrorist attack, I would live out one of my dream and spend some real time in this country I have been lusting over my entire life. Being that I’m writing this there was no ill-fated plan to bring down my plane.

And here I sit in France.

Now of course, this all sounds easier said than done. Making the decision and then obtaining a French visa were two very different things. I have never in my life gone through a more frustrating, confusing process.  I didn’t give up, though there were some tears. I learned the first valuable lesson in French living- French Bureaucracy is difficult.

So what am I doing here? First, I’m living. I’m watching the sunsets. I’m picking grapes and eating them. I’m buying a warm baguette at the patisserie every morning and counting the hours by the sound of the bell tolls in town rather than on my iPhone. I wake up with the sunlight, not an alarm clock. I buy the local wine. I marvel to myself how different a lemon smells here freshly sliced and how did I not know the beautiful perfume of fresh cracked pepper before? I pet every dog in sight. I visit the markets and make notes on the minute details and differences. I’m trying new styles from my black New York uniform. I’m SLOWLY learning French. I’m taking my camera out and pointing her at this stunning place, capturing what mesmerizes me about this organic way of life.

To be honest, I needed a refresh from New York. I needed to do something new and different. Stimulate my brain in a different way. I talk about the fragility of creativity and I needed to give mine a rest. I wanted to give her the opportunity to explore new visions and new forms of idea and expression. I know what living in New York means. I wanted to know that aspect of France as well. As I have been taking the time to be present I’m already beginning to have new vision, still lives I want to create around the Provencal table. A place where things come in and out of your life with the passing seasons. A vision of women I want to capture that celebrates their natural beauty on film, un-retouched in a world of manipulation. I feel that excitement toward photography I had when I first started out at 13. When holding a camera in your hands wasn’t a job. It was an adventure. What can you capture, and what can you create…

I think everyone would assume I would have chosen Paris. I love Paris more than any other city in the world. She is my dream. But I didn’t want to just change from fancy New York parties to fancy French parties, the same kind of people, the same kind of work, and the same kind of pace to life. I wanted to really be in a different place, experience another world. I am in the south, in a very small town in Provence, a part of the Luberon. It’s quaint and it’s quiet and though small, it is somehow opening my heart and mind to a whole other world of endless ideas.

It’s not forever, but it is for now and now is right where I want to be. 

Sunset vista from the small Provencal town of Bonnieux, France

Above, working from a hilltop coffee shop in the little charming town of Bonnieux.

More Provence stories here.

F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “My Lost City”

A look at Manhattan as it was from the window of an airplane

“From the ruins, lonely and inexplicable as the sphinx, rose the Empire State Building.

And just as it had been tradition of mine to climb to the Plaza roof to take leave of the beautiful city extending as far as the eyes could see, so now I went to the roof of that last and most magnificent of towers.
Then I understood. Everything was explained. I had discovered the crowning error of the city. Its Pandora’s box.

Full of vaunting pride, the New Yorker had climbed here, and seen with dismay what he had never suspected. That the city was not the endless sucession of canyons that he had supposed, but that it had limits, fading out into the country on all sides into an expanse of green and blue. That alone was limitless.

And with the awful realization that New York was a city after all and not a universe, the whole shining ediface that he had reared in his mind came crashing down.

That was the gift of Alfred Smith to the citizens of New York.”

F. Scott Fitzgerald, My Lost City: Personal Essays 1920-40

More New York HERE

 

Big Sur

California's Big Sur, a sceneic drive along the pacific coast highway

I’ve always wanted to drive along Big Sur, the dramatic edge of the western United States. While in Pebble Beach with Lincoln Motor Company, it seemed like the appropriate time to do that all-American activity of going for a drive, listening to old Beatles songs and Elton John favorites, pulling over every two miles to look in awe at the real picture show that is Big Sur.

California's Big Sur, a sceneic drive along the pacific coast highway California's Big Sur, a sceneic drive along the pacific coast highway California's Big Sur, a sceneic drive along the pacific coast highway California's Big Sur, a sceneic drive along the pacific coast highway

 

Captured on 4×5 black and white Ilford Delta film

Part III: Berlin

In the 1950s, my grandfather Beck was stationed in Berlin. Growing up as a child, I was always so fascinated by the old black & white photos of him from this era in this place unlike anything I knew on the country roads of Texas. I’ve always wanted to go and walk in his footsteps, to think of him as a young man, his family so far away, the devastation of war in front of him. We walked from East to West, we studied the differences from old photographs. We wandered the streets of Scheunenviertel and Kurfürstendamm. We had pretzels and beer, schnitzel and sauerkraut and look back in time of a city that changed so much.

Berlin in black and white film photographsBerlin in black and white film photographs Berlin in black and white film photographs   Berlin in black and white film photographs

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Patagonia’s Sky

A photographic journey through Chilean Patagonia region

The  most beautiful view is the one looking up.

Patagonia’s skies are true works of art. With the drama of a Renaissance painting and the bizarre UFO-like nature of lenticular clouds there is never a dull moment, as if the sky was nature’s form of entertainment. It all just gives way for the spectacular light show that happens this far south leaving you with the memories of the most beautiful saturation and contrasts of colors that can only be found in Patagonia.

“The poetry of the earth is never dead.”

– John Keats

A photographic journey through Chilean Patagonia region A photographic journey through Chilean Patagonia region   Patagonia_Air_07 A photographic journey through Chilean Patagonia region

 

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Patagonia’s Water

A photographic journey through Chilean Patagonia region

It’s hard to describe seeing a glacier for the first time: the seemingly unnatural color, how still it appears to be when in fact it is a moving river, the god-like size that reminds you of your fragile, ephemeral life… all I can say is that I couldn’t stop staring until I had become completely enchanted. And now, thanks to our Quasar tour guide, I can say I have eaten glacier ice straight off of an iceberg.

The might of Patagonia has to lie within its waters. From the spectacular green color of Lake Pehoé to Lake Grey with its floating icebergs and then to be hit with the rapid roaring waterfalls of Salto Grande and Cascada Rio Paine, and finally down comes rain out of clouds that redefine the word drama. Water is all around you, and never in a boring fashion.

“I climbed a path and from the top looked up-stream towards Chile. I could see the river, glinting and sliding through the bone-white cliffs with strips of emerald cultivation either side. Away from the cliffs was the desert. There was no sound but the wind, whirring through thorns and whistling through dead grass, and no other sign of life but a hawk, and a black beetle easing over white stones.”
― Bruce Chatwin

  A photographic journey through Chilean Patagonia region

A photographic journey through Chilean Patagonia region

A photographic journey through Chilean Patagonia region

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Patagonia’s Land

A photographic journey through Chilean Patagonia region

We headed out for adventure. Deep into Chilean Patagonia in Torres del Paine National Park we rode horses for hours with gauchos, explored caves where giants used to live, stared in awe at Cleopatra’s Needles, stopped to take in the first sights of guanaco I have only read about in Charles Darwin’s descriptions and enjoyed endless fields of baby sheep. The first thing that struck me about Patagonia was how untouched it is by man. No red lights or bill boards, no gas stations or pavement and no cell service. It is truly a completely unpolluted environment. You stand in the center of Patagonia, so far from anything familiar, so alone, hours from other humans and as far as the eye can see there is infinite beauty, purity and vast wonderment.

“What on earth makes you choose such an outlandish part of the world to go to? What can be the attraction? These, and similar questions and exclamations I heard from the lips of my friends and acquaintances, when I told them of my intended trip to Patagonia, the land of the Giants. What was the attraction in going to an outlandish place so many miles away? The answer to the question was contained in its own words. Precisely because it was an outlandish place and so far away, I chose it. Palled for the moment with civilization and its surroundings, I wanted to escape somewhere where I could be as far removed from them as possible. There I would be able to penetrate into vast wilds, virgin as yet to the foot of man. Scenes of infinite beauty and grandeur might be lying hidden in the silent solitude of the mountains that bound the barren plains of the Pampas, into whose mysterious recesses no one as yet had ever ventured.”

Lady Florence Dixie, 1880

A photographic journey through Chilean Patagonia region A photographic journey through Chilean Patagonia region A photographic journey through Chilean Patagonia region A photographic journey through Chilean Patagonia region

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Adam Katseff

You do not want to put Adam and I across from each other at a dinner table too often because we will close a restaurant talking about photography, photographers, film vs. digital, the meaning behind photographs, technical process, how people experience photographs as art, who, in the history of photography, were influential in changing the dialogue in which we communicate through images and how technology is constantly changing photography everyday.

Back this past summer we were on a location shoot in Lake Tahoe with a client that has since become a wonderful friend and her husband who is a photographer was preparing for his first solo show in New York at the Sasha Wolf Gallery came along. It was fascinating to watch him work in the slowed down process of large format film. Of course, I immediately think of Ansel Adams, but some of his heroes are Ad Reinhardt and Hiroshi Sugimoto. In the car he kept a book of photographs from the late 1800s of the Lake Tahoe area and would study them declaring to search for “that waterfall” or point out boulders that now have tunnels cut through them. The great thing about Adam’s work is not that he creates beautiful landscape photographs but that what he sees before you is a totally new way of looking at something we’ve all seen photographed a million times and yet strangely relatable, the way your eyes adjust at night in those peaceful moments in nature.

It was such a thrill to get to see him create and now, to see the end result hanging on the walls of a gallery to be experienced. We sat down to discuss the thought behind his images, how he got to where he is now, and what’s next:

Jamie: How did the idea for the series of Night Landscapes begin?

Adam: We were on a plane back from Hawaii, flying at sunset. The sun sets really fast when you’re flying west to east. I looked away from the window for a couple of minutes and when I looked back, it was black…almost instantly dark. So I was watching the surface of the ocean and it felt like you could almost see the roundness of the Earth. I’m letting my eyes adjust and I start seeing the landscape, the earth, the way I had seen it before the sun had set. And then I realized what I was seeing – I looked again and it’s like, Wait a minute, there’s nothing there, it’s totally pitch black. And it was the memory of that landscape, not the actual landscape itself. It was almost the reflections on the window that I was imagining as the thing.

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Atacama Desert

After the exploration of Santiago and Valparaiso we took a dramatic turn to the northern part of Chile and the very remote Atacama desert. Though I’ve seen some beautiful desert landscapes, nothing compared to the foreign view we found here which reminded us more of MARS than any place on this earth. Even the name of one of the expansive vistas, Moon Valley, solidifies you are not alone in your galactic references. It’s hard to imagine that something so obscure, otherworldly and barren can be so beautiful but it is! The endless sky, the ever changing colors, the sculptural nature of rocks from behind massive dunes. Over our 3 day tour of the Atacama desert we would discover llamas in the wild, a town kept alive by 15 people, no stop signs or red lights and nothing even close to an advertisement, salt flats and volcanoes, rock engravings, valleys and geysers and the *most* unbelievable night sky I have ever seen you can find #onlyinsouthamerica 

I was quite enchanted with the colors of the salt flats, the O’Keeffe nature of the gradients, especially just after the sun had set and the mountains were a wash of early evening violet. These low valley salt flats, a result of the surrounding volcanic mountains, are very shallow and when I touched my hand under the surface I watched my skin wrinkle and dry out as if I was instantly aging myself by 30 years. 

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HowAboutWe…

After our first year of marriage we decided it was important to keep dating each other…to keep discovering, learning and growing together. Thanks to HowAboutWe’s new service for couples, for those of us who want to “stay in love”, we have been able to easily achieve this goal we have set. Of course we still do the classic nights at the ballet and all those oh-so-glamorous events as dates, but with HowAboutWe we get to really do something different. Last month we tried our hand at glass blowing (I now show off our lopsided glasses on photo shoots at the studio like a proud parent) and this month it was a hot air balloon ride, planned and booked through the HowAboutWe Concierge! The concierge service allows you to make special one of a kind dates like this one with the help of a HowAboutWe planning expert…perfect for celebrating anniversaries, planning a baby moon, or setting up the proposal just so…

I don’t know if you guys caught this but we just bought our first car! I’m still trying to name her (deciding between Jolene because she is a lady that has been around, you know, Khaleesi because she is such a queen, or E.H. Yuppie…you know, to celebrate the 80’s). So I really wanted a date where we could drive out of the city! Such an exciting new adventure!

     

Watching the balloons take shape… feeling very trepidatious!

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Central Park Summer

Central Park (19)

Central Park (18)

Paddle boats gliding by, paths that wind around until you emerge upon a serene view, nature so lush in the middle of our busy city you would think you were miles away from it all. I love Central Park. For four years I lived on its edge, watching it through all the seasons and escaping into it on evening walks. I was so happy to see her again on this summer afternoon when the air was thick and laughter distant…

Central Park (17) Central Park (16)

I thank you God for this most amazing day, for the leaping greenly spirits of trees, and for the blue dream of sky and for everything which is natural, which is infinite, which is yes. – e. e. cummings 

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Lake Tahoe

Lake Tahoe (1)

Lake Tahoe  (2)

“It was the end of August, and the skies were cloudless and the weather superb…It seemed to me that nothing could be so fine and so romantic.” – Mark Twain

What is it about water that has such an effect on us? An afternoon of endless gazing we give to a vista of water so vibrantly blue it is as if a child colored it. Deep breaths… the simple joy of clean air fills your lungs and your body feels connected to the earth, this mesmerizing place of peace and tranquility. We walked on pine needles and felt the mist of roaring rapids vapor kisses on our faces and discussed how magnificent Mother Nature truly can be. A few days at Lake Tahoe, a few photographs to remember…

Lake Tahoe  (3) Lake Tahoe  (4)

“…at last the Lake burst upon us — a noble sheet of blue water lifted six thousand three hundred feet above the level of the sea, and walled in by a rim of snow-clad mountain peaks that towered aloft full three thousand feet higher still! It was a vast oval, and one would have to use up eighty or a hundred good miles in traveling around it. As it lay there with the shadows of the mountains brilliantly photographed upon its still surface I thought it must surely be the fairest picture the whole earth affords.”

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