Betsy Weis
 
   
"We do not see what we see…only what we remember..."* My art is about light, time, perception, beauty and memory. My process starts in nature. I use the digital camera and the computer, which can discern more color and light values than the human eye and enable me to describe more clearly, more intimately and more distinctively the texture of natural space. Paradoxically, the digital process, once conceived as anti-human, evolves into a sensuous memory of the natural world stimulating viewers into an intimate experience of the dreamy fluid environs that nature evokes.

My recent series Icelandia describes a natural landscape of ice, snow, rocks and sky. The open, barren lavaland is a pristine reserve of black and white, water, air and sky. These images of a coolly temperate space define a late winter sanctuary. Slightly blurred forms, bright light and the landscapes' rich and textured palette of mostly white, evocatively draw out the memory of the natural world. The viewer's mental space, reminded of being in the elements, the boundaries blurred between outer and personal, is transformed into a state of contemplation of the cycle of life and death, and the experiences of dreaming, sleep and remembering.

*Paraphrase of a comment by the late composer of the New York School, Morton Feldman. Cited in a lecture by Clark Lunberry, “Remembrance of Things Present: Steven Foster’s Repetition Series Photographs, Morton Feldman’s Triadic Memoriesgeocities.com
     

©2008 Betsy Weis
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