The rolling landscapes of western Massachusetts have been home to five generations of my family, including my children. I’ve also lived for many years in the American Southwest, where dramatic natural beauty is more immediately apparent. By comparison, southern New England offers a quieter, less overt kind of splendor. As a child, I was attuned to what I perceived as the living forces in the forests and meadows where I lived. In recent years, the routine practice of observing small moments through the seasons with my camera has helped me reconnect with that early, numinous sense of presence in the natural world.
Through this ongoing practice, I’ve come to understand awe not as something reserved for dramatic vistas, but as an experience that can be cultivated through attention. Much psychological and philosophical writing on perception suggests that our senses do not simply record reality—they shape it. Our perceptual limits create the very conditions through which we experience wonder. That idea has increasingly informed my work.
After photographing these scenes with care and precision, I made the deliberate choice to blur the images so they sit just beyond clear recognition. This interruption of visual clarity limits both distills something essential of the image and also the viewer’s ability to process them conventionally. By hovering at the threshold of legibility, the photographs evoke a dreamlike, liminal state, perhaps a place where certainty can soften and allow another experience.
Giclée prints on Hahnemühle Fine Art Pearl
Editions of 10 + 2 AP
30×24”
Inquire: shelley@shelleykirkwood.com