gdanmitchell
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Gregg B. wrote:
I'I know I've only scratched the surface since I've done so far only three major hikes to several lakes but I've planned at least 20 more already to hike up and see what this huge 130 miles long range has to offer.
These five shots came from various spots. Some of you can easily recognize them and if you do please don't spell out the place's name here. I don't want these locations to get flooded with pseudo-hikers/photographers and "trashed" like Patagonia.
Gregg,
Lovely work from "my" Sierra Nevada.
As a photographer who has been hiking (climbing, camping, backpacking, x-c and tele skiing, and more) in the range since, well, decades ago...
... I'm grateful for your reminder about the fragility of the place and the importance of allowing people to discover places via their own sweat... and for speaking up about not naming every darned place where we make a photograph.
Aside from completely obvious locations (Half Dome, anyone?) I stopped including location information on photographs, especially when posted on the internet, perhaps almost a decade ago. Several factors pushed me in this direction, the first two of which were crystalized by conversations with other photographers who have worked this subject for years and with a friend who was a long-time Yosemite ranger.
1. As you point out, many locations in the Sierra (and other popular places) are feeling the pressure of too many people and, even more so perhaps, too many people in a few supposedly extra-special places. It turns out that both individually and collectively we, as photographers, need to exercise some restraint on behalf of these beautiful and fragile places. (It isn't that we are "trying to keep them to ourselves" — everyone is free to discover them as we did — but we don't want to be complicit in the destruction of what makes them special.)
2. Great photographs speak as photographs, and their power to do so is rarely dependent on naming the thing in the photograph. A photograph of, say, Mount Whitney isn't so much about the physical fact of that mountain as it is about the light, the atmosphere, color, texture, and, when you come right down to it, the experience of all mountains. (I distinctly recall the last pack trip of mine that included the Whitney summit. I decided to not go there again. There are too many other equally or even more beautiful peaks in this range.)
3. Speaking of that last point, beauty is to be found everywhere throughout the Sierra, and those who explore will find it. Trust me when I say that it is a much greater joy by far to spend time wandering and looking and waiting for light in your own places than to make yet another photograph of a place we've all seen.
Again, thanks.
Dan
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