MARSHA OWETT

What one sees on the surface, quite literally in this case, does not interest me as much as what lies hidden beneath.  Here I found the rare beauty that is only visible for a moment between pulsating waves fascinating, not only for its fleeting nature, but also for the way that a field of young muscles could transform into a dark volcanic canyon, a distant solar system, and more.

There’s a moment after the tide has gone out and the beach is left covered with a newly dried and unblemished layer of fragile sand, and seaweed. This thin crust stays perfect only for a short time, until it is broken by footsteps or a fresh tide. Like rolls of flesh, it has contours and spots. Like skin, it looks completely different up close than from afar. Skin is the thin veneer that covers the unimaginable beneath it. It’s the façade that we show to others. It’s a fragile layer that holds everything together. It gets damaged, and then heals itself, sometimes with scars, sometimes as if it is brand new.

I am drawn to the randomness of nature that masquerades as abstraction. I do not disturb or rearrange what I photograph. I photograph still life in its truest form— life, still and undisturbed. During my time in Shimodo I became fascinated by the randomness of the sea and what it leaves behind, which is both so haunting and beautiful. Pebbles on the beach, ripples in the sand left by a gentile on flow of water, tidal pools shimmering in the sun take on a vastly larger dimension in my lens. Objects and patterns metamorphose as one looks at them.  First they have one meaning, then another.  The more one studies the photograph, the more the image’s meaning shifts. Rocks become mountains, cracks become rivers, and ripples become gold.

Alchemy, an ancient philosophical belief that base metals could be turned into gold, and mortality into immortality. When I turned my lens into the clear waters of Crystal Lake on the Michigan peninsula, I believed in alchemy too. The water was lit by that golden late summer light you only see up north, a few hours before dusk. The water was on fire, and seemed to cast a golden light on the sand and stones beneath. The stones had been there for centuries, and would surely remain for many more, thus immortal. These micro-landscapes capture the optimistic glow of summer. And just as alchemy changes the properties of nature, so does the lens. A lake bed changes into a vast seascape, and then into a reptiles skin, then into something else. Such is alchemy.