Some recently roughly scanned images from Ampersand Mountain...

I spent some time this past week photographing around Ampersand Mountain and near the Lake Country of the Adirondacks. The first afternoon was a sad an attempt at climbing up to the top of Ampersand which failed because of ice and a stubborn clumsy bulldog. But the next day I lugged my Mamiya RZ into the surrounding old growth forest at the base of the mountain and spent five hours studying all the beauty and abjectness that a late autumn ancient forest has to offer. Being so still and quiet while setting up each shot offered an opportunity to really see the woods, and hear and smell and touch. Wildlife emerged out of holes and from a distance.  Climbing off trail to get to some particular fallen tree, my hands grasped layers of moss and lichens, soft and wet. We never got to see the view at the top of Ampersand, but many of the hikers rushing past us never got to see the forest like I did. It takes patience to be still, but I think spending several hours just sitting on a log in the middle of the woods, is just as rewarding as a panaromic view.

“If there were a little more silence, if we all kept quiet… maybe we could understand something”
-Federico Fellini

In a few days I will be spending a week in the Adirondacks. The intention is to photograph for the  Bodies of Dirt project in the surrounding Primeval forest areas. According to a book on Ancient Forests, the Adirondacks has one of the largest tracks of first growth or Primeval forest area in New York State. Roughly 300,000 acres. I have been  to some old growth areas in the Catskills recently but am particularly excited by the huge scale that areas in the Saranac Lake region have to offer. The opportunity for silence is another experience i will savor.  Being in a forest area covered with lichen and moss, with a mixture of evergreen and broadleaf woodland seems to dampen sound, everything is brought to a whisper, even the wind. It invites contemplation.