Please, do sweat the small stuff!

As Above, So Below

   We've all heard the old adage, "Don't sweat the small stuff!"  I'm here to say that it is all small stuff and it is well worth the effort.

   Thoreau said that there are two ways to view the landscape, with a telescope or a microscope.  Somehow I think the answer lies in between.  While we all love the grand vista, it is in the intimate details that I find the most enjoyment.  For me, the landscape is the sum total of the myriad details that make it up.

The moment one gives close attention to anything, even a blade of grass, it becomes a mysterious, awesome, indescribably magnificent world in itself.

- Henry Miller

   While I love to photograph the sweep of a pond,  the big view, I am most content with the closer, more personal relationship I can forge with the small details of the landscape.  Like this study of reflections at a friends pond this summer.

   I was captivated by the light, the color and, of course, the amazing reflection in the still water.  And moving in to a more intimate detail creates a lovely abstraction.  Yet, everything the larger photograph has is contained in the small view.

   The closer I get into the landscape the more impressionistic and even abstract it becomes.  I've certainly discovered this in my project The Poetry of Place.   It really is, in the final analysis, up to your personal engagement with the landscape...do you take the large view or the small view?  Or perhaps, like me, do you enjoy the process of walking into the landscape, to try and see the whole from a small part?  Here is a link to a discussion on three different ways to engage the landscape...try them all!

Photographing the Landscape

   No matter which of the three you decide suits you, keep your mind and heart open.  Sometimes it is the landscape itself that will tell you what you need to do.