Saturday, December 5, 2020
Featured Photographer: Debbie Brady
Introducing one of our newer members, Debbie Brady of OysterArt.ca. Debbie has achieved her first Accreditation in Fine Art/Photo Decor, and scored Accepted with her first entry into our regional image competition this year. (Headshot photo credit: Lisa Enman Photography).
Disruption - (St Chrysostome, PE)
"An obscure unseen disturbance has disrupted this miniature fragile equilibrium." (This is a composite of 30 stacked images.)
"I live on an apple farm in rural Prince Edward Island where, for over 20 years, I’ve been enjoying my career as a graphic designer. Throughout my life, I’ve dabbled in a variety of creative outlets—but only until I unraveled the mystery they initially afforded. No other artistic endeavour has engaged me so thoroughly as photography. I’m repeatedly drawn to using macro & close-up photography to creatively tell stories with my camera. I seek out things easily overlooked to see what they're hiding from casual view. In 2016 I was using my macro lens to check out some beach treasures I'd collected which included an oyster shell. They had this beautiful texture. I was totally impressed seeing something extraordinarily new in something so familiar! It took me three years of collecting, cataloging, photographing, and assessing the idea before I developed a plan to launch an “Oyster Art” collection in a way that would garner the attention nature's creation deserve. The photographer Ansel Adams said it for me “I work to transform curiosity into art.”
Enchanted - (Sandhills, PE) Pearl Edition
"An enticing, otherworldly dimension is revealed where one can imagine wishes coming true and fairies gathering to collect stories of magic and childhood wonders." (This is a composite of 12 stacked images.)
This small world was discovered in an oyster shell from PEI’s Sandhills, one of the least disturbed and most ecologically significant coastal dune complexes in eastern Canada.
Each works magnifies a tiny portion of the shell until it is unrecognizable as a mollusk. Instead, it often looks like a galaxy or a satellite view of the earth. The smallest of things and the largest of things come full circle in an oyster shell. I love the challenge of exploring and photographing “near space” then creating art that shares and celebrates it.
Exuberant - (Malpeque, PE)
"Vitality abounds as this assembly of colours moves with uninhibited enthusiasm." This was a single photo taken while visiting an aqua farmer. With no focus stacking the perimeter is soft but the beautiful colours draw one's eye to the center."
Mesmerizing - (Greenwich, PE)
"The experience of floating midst gently lapping waves is incapable of being
anything less than mesmerizing." (This is a composite of 59 stacked images.)
The more I studied oysters visually, the more curious I grew about these creatures, and visited aqua farmers for what one called my “oysters 101 lesson.” I even went out on a fishing boat “tonging”: harvesting wild oysters with tools that look like long-handled rakes. (Photo credit: Caley Joy photography).
Metamorphosis - (St Chrysostome, PE)
"On life's journey to maturity there are many catalysts for that metamorphosis."
Tumult - (Brackley, PE) Limited Edition
"One can only imagine the journey this oyster shell has taken to arrive in its current weathered and battered state. The swirls of colour and texture take your eyes on a visual exploration of the tumultuous patterns they created."