Reverent Marvels
by Maura H. Harrison
Borrowing a phrase from Julian of Norwich, I think it is important that “one should reverently marvel and humbly endure, ever delighting in God.” As a photographer, this idea directs my eye. Everywhere I look, I challenge myself to notice the beauty and marvels of God's natural world. In finding them, I hope to capture that beauty in a photograph so that I can share God’s marvels with others.
Sometimes my visual art is the singular photograph as taken with the camera. Sometimes this singular photograph has been digitally edited to enhance detail or color. Often, the final piece of art is a composite, or collage if you will, of several photographs.
Under a Shady Tree. March 2023. Digital photograph.
Delivering Dreams. July 2018. Digital photograph.
March Madness I. March 2023. Digital photograph.
The works here represent the range of this working process. Under a Shady Tree is a photograph of found natural objects arranged into a still-life composition and placed on a white dinner plate. Delivering Dreams is a photograph of a spring hatch of bugs on my car’s bumper. The large pink area in the middle is my cell-phone case. The saturation of colors has been manipulated to create a lusher image. Lastly, March Madness I is a composite of photographs, wherein the scale of one of the photographs has been exaggerated. The opacity of this layer has been altered to create a layer of texture that invites surprise and wonder.
The subjects in these photographs are natural objects existing in the physical world. Treating them as I do, I hope to capture some of the magic and wonder I see and to allow the viewer as well to notice the beauty in the natural world.
Maura H. Harrison is a writer, photographer, and fiber artist from Fredericksburg, VA. She is currently pursuing an MFA in Creative Writing at the University of St. Thomas, Houston.
