Pictures (Including One of Mine!) At An Exhibition

I haven't had a chance to tell you much about this, but I have some exciting news! I entered three of my favorite local pictures in a juried photo contest that accompanies our famous annual Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts. The exhibit is called Seeing America: Centre County in Photographs.

In the spring, there was a call for entries. They were asking for photos taken on or after January 1, 2013, showing life in Centre County. So many people sent me the link and encouraged me to participate that I finally did. And then the happy news came back: one of my favorite photos - Millbrook: Frost Mist Rising - was selected to appear in the exhibition! (You can see it in this photo, to the right of the mirror: two to the right, the lower picture.)

I don't really print out my photos anymore, except for the few that I include in the little photo books that I make at somewhat regular intervals. So I had to arrange to print the photo (I decided on 16" by 20") and buy a frame. There was a limited window of time to drop our pictures off, and I did that. (My current Blip profile picture is actually a photo of me dropping mine off; I was very excited, as you can probably tell!)

I was invited to the gallery opening, which occurred on June 30 from 7 to 9 pm. I had intended to stay for most of it if I could, and I'm not sure what I expected, but when my husband and I got there, it was extremely crowded (it turns out that about 161 people were there in this not-very-large room), there were no chairs for sitting, and the gallery was very hot and uncomfortable.

They provided a nice selection of drinks and snacks, and the exhibit itself was really lovely; I walked around and looked at all of the entries. The winners had already been identified, and my photo was not among them. I haven't mentioned this about me here, but in real life, I tend to be a bit of a social phobe: I don't seek out large crowds; I make excuses not to attend most parties. We managed to stay for about 45 minutes before giving up and heading home.

I had also agreed to serve as gallery host for two hours while the exhibit was open, and that is what I did from 3 to 5 pm on this day. Contrary to the opening event, my stint as gallery host was very low-key and laid-back. In fact, for most of the time that I was there, I was alone with the pictures. I had seven visitors, and each of them very politely inquired who I was and whether I had any pictures in the exhibit. When I said yes, they all found something encouraging to say about my photo.

They also wanted to hear about the making of the photo. Where had I been, and when? How did I get it to look like that, have colors like that? And I was happy to tell them the tale: about how I rose early one bitterly cold late-January morning (it was about 8 degrees F) and stopped by one of my favorite photo haunts, Millbrook Marsh, before work; how there was frost over everything, hard frost, and the instant the sun hit the valley, the frost turned to mist and rose like angels into the sky. It lasted only about 15 minutes and then it was gone. If you showed up even a half-hour later, you'd never have known the magic that you missed (mist?).

I have had people ask me questions like: How did you know it would do that? How did you know that this is what you would see? Why would anyone be out in conditions as extreme as that? And I had to tell them the truth, which was: I didn't really know it would do that; in fact, I'd never seen anything like that before in my life!

No, I didn't know that this is what I would see, but I had a hunch (a hunch I often get) that if I just show up, something wonderful will make it well worth my while. I frequently arrange to place myself somewhere promising at times and places of transition, of good light; times and places where the magic happens. It doesn't always, but sometimes it does. And then when it happens, some might say I'm lucky. But let me tell you a secret: behind the scenes, making magic takes some thought, effort, and planning!

There is a quote about some huge percentage of success being just showing up. I think it's been attributed to Woody Allen, but others might have said it too. I am a fan of morning light. The hardest part is getting out of bed and going somewhere early. The reward, if you can do it, is that you will see some truly amazing things.

And about how I got the photo to look like that: well, I hate to burst anyone's bubble, but I showed up, I set the camera on "automatic," and I snapped the shot. A whole lot of shots, in fact. I didn't edit this one at all. The shot you see is the shot that came out of the camera. Yes, it looked just like that; I was there.

During the time that I was alone on this afternoon, I took some pictures of the gallery, with my framed picture (and me!) in it. In this photo, I am both waving and kicking up my heels and dancing. Maybe I look a little bit like Mary Poppins, although I bet that Mary never wore the shade of violet storm nail polish I had on my toes, or the high heels I had on. I wanted to wear fancy shoes that I thought some artiste hosting a gallery might wear, and these (too bad you can't see them or the polish too well from here) are stunners. They are shoes for the girl I wish I could be.

I took a really great picture of a blue-nosed dragonfly on this day that you'll never get to see. It was a lot like this one (heck, it might have even been the same bug!) and maybe even better, but I'll have to catch up with that fellow some other day. From the moment that I signed up to help serve as gallery host, I knew that I wanted a gallery photo to be my picture to document this day.

So here it is. This is a picture of me enjoying myself, celebrating my inclusion in my very first juried photo exhibit ever. It may not be the only time this happens, but just in case it is, this photograph is proof. Proof that I was here. Proof that I took a picture that somebody liked enough to select it for inclusion in a real-life photography exhibit. Look at me: I am waving. I am dancing. I am living my dream!

I knew from the very minute I planned this photo what the song to accompany it would be, and of course some of you have guessed it by now. The song is the progressive rock band Emerson, Lake, and Palmer's 1971 classic twist on Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition. The individual songs represent a stroll through a gallery, and I thought that was just perfect to represent this moment captured in time.