Luscious lumens
Sometimes a book shows up that's eyecatching AND educational.
"Understory: Lumen Prints of Florida Flora" is one of those books. And for all you lucky
locals, there's an exhibit that goes along with it -- on display through July 17 at the Southeast Museum of Photography, 1200 International Speedway Blvd., Building 1200, Daytona Beach.
Admission is free. Visitor parking is available. For information, call 386-506-4475. Museum hours are from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Tuesday, Thursday, Friday; from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Wednesday and from 1 to 5 p.m. weekends; closed on Monday. June and July hours are from noon to 4 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday, but closed on the Fourth of July. Got all that? I suppose that's why the college (the museum is at the Daytona State College campus) includes a phone number.
Here's an excerpt from a news release that tells the story of Burchfield's project --behind the book and the exhibit.
Over a two-year period Jerry Burchfield traveled to Florida to complete fieldwork, specimen gathering and the photographic recording of plant specimens. The elegant pastels and
glowing forms that emerge in his beautiful prints, installations and spectacular collages remind us of the primordial power, vitality and energy of a natural environment that has faded into oblivion.
He has deliberately reverted to working on-site directly from plant specimens, and his "photogenic" drawing is derived, as was that of William Henry Fox Talbot, from the long history of botanical illustration, specimen notes and the iconography of the metaphorical florilegium. Just as a fossil, with its direct impression of the living form that was once there, has the ability to arrest us and collapse the time that has passed since it was created, so his sublime images have the power to move us in a complex and beguiling way.
Although his project is chiefly artistic and evocative, it is also based on scientific principles and identifications. The largest collage reproduces the main elements of an entire east central Florida eco-system; the pine flatwoods.
The elegant pastels and glowing forms that emerge in his beautiful lumen prints (see gallery notes for an explanation of this process) remind us of the primordial power, vitality, and energy of a natural environment that has faded into oblivion. In his willingness to submit to natural processes rather than assert domination over his subject, Jerry Burchfield is a most respectful and humble soul-a powerful metaphor indeed.
"We are able to read Burchfield's lumen prints as symbol and metaphor . . . visions of strange, private, disturbing, psychological and mythic worlds felt or discovered by the photographer." -- Jonathan Green.
(Johnathan Green wrote the introduction to Jerry Burchfield's book "Primal Images: 100 Lumen Prints of Amazonia Flora." He is currently the executive director of UCR/ARTSblock in Riverside, Calif., and is the former director of the UCR/California Museum of Photography.)
"Burchfield has composed a body of work that transcends utilitarian concerns to explore a mysterious creative arena where chance and skill collaborate. From the earliest photographic experiments with light-sensitive materials to modernist fascination with the subconscious to current conceptual practice, Burchfield's lumen prints suggest the gamut of the history of photography." -- Thomas McGovern.
(Thomas McGovern is an artist/photographer and professor at California State University, San Bernardino.)
"Understory: Lumen Prints of Florida Flora," by Jerry Burchfield, Laguna Wilderness Press, 96 pages, $35, hard cover