Autumn Hike in Wisconsin

October 13, 2012 by 7 Comments
Autumn Walk XI

Let’s Take an Autumn Walk ©2012 Bo Mackison

A Colorful Autumn Hike in Wisconsin

One of the urban parks in Madison, Wisconsin – Owen Conservation Park – has a maze of hiking trails. There are dozens of paths, views of the city, prairie remnants, trails through hardwood forests, and a small pond for water fowl. The park seems specially designed for a colorful hike in autumn.

Autumn Walk VII

View Across the Prairie ©2012 Bo Mackison

Prairie view. Most of the golden-rods and asters – the last blooms in autumn – have now gone to seed. The prairie is filled with fluffs of white blowing seeds.

Autumn Walk III

Autumn Colors in the Woods ©2012 Bo Mackison

The forests, though small, have a fine variety of hardwoods. Maples, oaks, hickory are the predominant species, and together produce a fine color mix of yellows, oranges, reds and browns.

Autumn Walk XII

Leafy Shadows in Autumn ©2012 Bo Mackison

I love to hike when the sun is still low enough in the morning to cast leafy shadows on the tree trunks in the more open spaces.

Autumn Walk VI

Reds and Yellows in Autumn ©2012 Bo Mackison

Sumacs give the park’s open spaces a deep red glow. More whites in the prairie — fluffy seeds. Yellow ashes still have some of their leaves.

Autumn Walk V

Autumn Walk in the Forest ©2012 Bo Mackison

Another path through the woods and I’m back to the parking area.

Autumn Walk I

Owen Park Road ©2012 Bo Mackison

Even while leaving the park, there are so many trees in bright colors. I pulled along the side of the road a half-dozen times for that “one last shot.”

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. Thankful for the opportunity for a nature walk today.

She is attending the Filter Festival in Chicago the week of October 15. Workshops, lecture series, gallery walks, portfolio reviews, and much more. But no opportunities for walks in the autumn woods.

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The Trees Speak of Connection

October 12, 2012 by 3 Comments
Olbrich Autumn Wonders - A World of Yellows

World in Yellow ©2012 Bo Mackison

Know that the tree is not just the form, it is not just a certain species the botanists’ talk about, it is an unknown god – so green in your courtyard, so close to you, beckoning you, calling you again and again. ~ Osho

My Connection to Nature

I often think that trees are the finest species on this earth. I love photographing flowers, grasses, natural landscapes. But there is something about the trees. In my part of the world, I am never far from some type of tree. There are usually a few trees in every yard, and large stands of trees in whatever direction I head from my home.

Grounded in the earth, they often stretch a hundred feet high, their tops surrounded only by sky when I peer at their crowns. I like being able to reach out my hand, rest my palm on the trunk of a tree, and feel a deep sense of connection to nature.

And I am happy that there are trees not only in my yard, and in my community, but I am also happy that there are trees even in downtown Chicago. I’ll be in Chicago next week. And I’ll be noticing the trees that grow there, even in the midst of a crowded metropolis.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. Yesterday she finished the printing of two sets of fine art photography and today she is putting the final touches on the two portfolios.

She is attending the Filter Festival in Chicago the week of October 15. Workshops, lecture series, gallery walks, portfolio reviews, and much more. Opportunity awaits.

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Art in the Gardens

September 10, 2012 by 3 Comments
Spikes and Yellow Fountain, Olbrich Gardens, Madison Wisconsin

Spikes and Yellow Fountain ©2012 Bo Mackison

I sit in my garden, gazing upon a beauty that cannot gaze upon itself.  And I find sufficient purpose for my day.  ~Robert Brault

Some gardens are just meant for sitting. There are nooks and crannies, places to sit and watch what goes on in a garden. One of my favorite benches is tucked in a corner of the botanical gardens in Madison. I sit there, take a few photographs, listen to the fountain waters trickle over this yellow pottery container and drip upon the pebbles, and do a little people watching, too.

Inflatable Sculptures in Olbrich Gardens

Inflatable Sculpture © 2012 Bo Mackison

Everything that slows us down and forces patience, everything that sets us back into the slow circles of nature, is a help.
  ~ May Sarton

Placed in half hidden places in Olbrich Gardens, there are several new sculptures by  Sturgeon Bay (Wisconsin) artist, Robert Anderson. He constructs large-scale sculptures out of metals and fills them with compressed air so that they expand.

Expanding Sculpture, Olbrich Gardens, Madison Wisconsin

Expanding Sculpture at Olbrich ©2012 Bo Mackison

Beauty is the adjustment of all parts proportionately so that one cannot add or subtract or change without impairing the harmony of the whole.
~ Leon B. Alberti

Every time I visit the gardens, the sculptures look a little different. I love this aluminum sculpture constructed of triangles. Half hidden in one of the natural gardens, it reminds me of a shiny serpent wending its way through tall grasses.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC. Walking (and sitting) in the area gardens is one of Bo’s daily pleasures.

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Art is What We Call . . .

September 8, 2012 by 5 Comments
Spotted Lily, Olbrich Gardens, Madison Wisconsin

Spotted Lily ©2011 Bo Mackison

“Art is what we call…the thing an artist does.

It’s not the medium or the oil or the price or whether it hangs on a wall or you eat it.

What matters, what makes it art,
is that the person who made it overcame the resistance,
ignored the voice of doubt and made something worth making.

Something risky. Something human.”

~ Seth Godin

I read Seth Godin’s words this weekend, and thought, “Oh yes, spot on.” This weekend I’ve been working non-stop on a photography project – a project that means a great deal to me on a personal level. It is my hope that the portfolio I’m assembling will also speak to other people. But what really matters, has already taken place. My photographs speak to me, make meaning, explain life.

What other people think is interesting, and I am always curious to hear what people truly think about a photograph I take and process. But another person’s opinion won’t change my thoughts. I’ve taken the photo, chosen it, looked at it carefully, even listened to it, and  – this is the biggest discovery – I’ve heard the photo speak to me with love.

It took time, and some learning, but finally, I’ve discovered my opinion about my photograph is the most important opinion. Not to say I don’t want to know what others think. I do, but with a caveat.

As Seth Godin so astutely said, in the last line of the above quote:

“Art is not in the . . . eye of the beholder.  It’s in the soul of the artist.”

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC.  She is currently assembling two portfolios for portfolio reviews — 5 reviewers, 5 reviews, 20 minutes each — for when she attends the Filter Photo Festival in Chicago in October. She is terribly excited about the coming experience!

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Journey to the Edge

August 31, 2012 by 4 Comments
Lake Michigan and Shore Grasses - at Sunrise

Lake Michigan and Shore Grasses – at Sunrise ©2012 Bo Mackison

We do not receive wisdom,
we must discover it for ourselves,
after a journey through the wilderness
which no one else can make for us,
which no one can spare us,
for our wisdom is the point of view
from which we come at last to regard the world.

Marcel Proust

 On a recent trip to Door County, I set my alarm for an hour before sunrise. Each time I visit, I make a point to cross the narrow peninsula, from my bay side motel to one of the lake side beaches or harbors, and set up my sunrise camp. There I am afforded an unobstructed view of sunrise, only Lake Michigan to my east and the hint of a dawn soon to come.

I love watching as the sun pops up from the horizon. I love the darkness turning to daylight. I love the feeling of being on the very edge of a new day, on the edge of the earth between earth and water, on the edge of the beach between sandy shore and lush beach vegetation. I love taking photographs with the scene bathed in the golden glow of early morning light. I don’t much care for taking photos of the actual sunrise (or sunset for that matter) but I do love turning my camera away from that giant source of light, and shooting in the opposite direction.

In this case, I was standing on a sandy stretch of beach near the Ridges Sanctuary, and nearby was a stretch of sand filled with a dense growth of beach grasses. I was positioned just north of Bailey’s Harbor (the water) and so a bit of Lake Michigan and Bailey’s Harbor (the village) are in the background.

It was a bit of a journey through wilderness to another discovery of wonder.

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Bo Mackison is a photographer and the owner of Seeded Earth Studio LLC.  She is busy with packing notes and to do lists. She is traveling to Milwaukee, Wisconsin to exhibit her photography at the Third Ward Art Festival  this weekend.

 

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