Lone Dancer With Moon

For every landscape artist, there is a place like no other; a place greater than the sum of its parts. Some call it sanctuary. Others call it refuge. For this pilgrim of the light, this salty edge of the once, great Everglades is mine; the picture a portrait of a lone red mangrove tree at first light.

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Sunbird II

The shapes and forms of the birds that live along the edges of Florida’s islands and ponds have always fascinated me. From this stately profile of a white ibis, it is easy to see why the ancient Egyptians were so smitten with the species. For me, the picture isn’t just about the bird’s curious shape but also the spacing of the waves around it. The ripples mirror the shape of the earth beneath.

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Angel on the River of Stars

The long-necked anhinga is another water-made islander. Because it dives and swims for its meal, it perches to dry its nearly oil-less wings or risk drowning. Against a nearly oxygen-depleted Everglades pond, its graceful shape offers counterpoint to the sharp and difficult problems below.

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Dancer's Light

Little more than sprouts growing from the stump of a bald cypress taken over a century ago by logging, this tree ‘dances’ in the cool light of a winter’s morning. Described in the early writings of naturalist William Bartram—and as evidenced from the few giant trees that remain, Florida was once a great and ranging cypress grove; its watery woodlands comparable to California’s majestic sequoia, genetic cousin to the cypress.

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Babies in Blue I

The life of a red mangrove tree begins with a seed pod that resembles the tip of a spear. When ripe, it falls from the mother tree like an arrow into the nursery beds of the tidal basin. From the seeds of film, “Babies In Blue I” and other mangrove portraits were born.

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Bird on a Line

In the sometimes unusual world of natural light photography, light seems to stack on film in much the same way an artist layers paint on a canvas. In this image, light appeared to puddle on the darkness, creating an island in the contrast.

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Palm Island

Before the wooden ships, water flowed across Florida in broad shallow sheets creating, over time, islands and dunes, ridges and basins that framed and formed the peninsula. Along the edges of the hundreds of lakes and ponds that were created, islands of palms clustered like stars in a watery constellation.

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Heron's Nest

There are times when the world seems to work as it was intended, when thoughts of Eden come easily. For this nesting great blue heron, Eden and its antagonists come with their own zip code: 32608.

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Fire Light

Musicians, especially jazz pianists, often refer to their compositions as “conversations,” a practice seldom enjoyed by photographers. On this day, the light raced and roared across the water as if on fire. And then it was gone, the light’s voice stilled.

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Antiquity

Florida’s wild places, even its magnificent Everglades, are seldom described as ancient. It is not accidental. Florida was the point of entry for the new world and the port of departure for some of the world’s most treasured woods. In “Antiquity,” there is a window to a time when the world was new, when the world drank from blue-eyed springs and marveled at the vastness and the richness of this earth.

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