Instructor
Art History
Hannah Tandeta
August 2020
Artist’s Statement
Lock down Photographs....
This Afternoon in the Garden
Landscape is not just a picture of a place, but a complex of ideas about a place. In this series, because I have to stay at home, I explore my yard. It’s also a challenge to myself to keep my observation and composition skills sharp. The pictures are not meant to be photographically perfect, or even particularly original. But taken altogether, they represent the passage of time and my ideas about this place. The process: When this project started, it wasn’t even supposed to be a project. Who knew I’d have to stay so close to home for so many months? Each day, between noon and sunset, I go out into my garden, and find something to photograph. Usually a few different things will catch my eye. I only use my I-phone, nothing fancy. Then I sit down and choose the most interesting of the dozen or so pictures I have made. I will make a few minor adjustments, a little cropping, a little sharpening, again, nothing fancy. I don’t want the individual pictures to be too precious. Then I send them to my friends. Sometimes they photograph their gardens and send pictures back. Sometimes they share views from their windows, sometimes tours of their home libraries. It’s a tiny moment of sharing between friends who must stay so widely separated.
