Photos and notes on all things Alaska.
Massive storm surge raises the high tide and creates crashing waves along the coast of Wrangell - St. Elias National Park and Preserve, Alaska. The sun breaks through right at sunset and provides some spectacular light. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.
Hey Folks,
Why do we stare at the sea?
Cheers
Carl
Brown bear, Ursus arctos, standing raised upright and rubbing her back against a birch tree in Katmai National Park and Preserve, Alaska. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.
Hey Folks,
I can’t imagine my father ever calling himself a “professional University lecturer” or my brother referring himself to as a “professional math teacher”.
The word professional means many things; but when it’s followed with a vocation, such as “photographer”, it doesn’t mean that you enjoy photography a lot, or that you speak politely about it, or that someone bought a print from you. It doesn’t even mean that you have a website. It doesn’t mean you teach workshops and lead tours, either.
Show me a professional photographer, and I’ll wager a dollar I’ll show you someone who’s struggled to pay their rent, who’s sold gear to make their car payment (or sold their car to make their gear payment), someone who’s eaten peanut butter sandwiches because that’s what was available to eat.
A professional photographer has made real sacrifice to do what they do (there are always exceptional cases, with trust funds, a wealthy spouse, etc). It’s a risk. It’s giving up an awful lot to choose to pursue a particular vocation. It’s losing on that risk, picking up, and swinging the stick again. And again. And yet again. Repeat, infinitum.
It sounds much more glamorous than it might be. It means you take the bus sometimes, it means you sit in the rain and wish you were somewhere else. It means you sometimes take a lower price for a sale because you need shoes. Pardon my French, but it means you’ve been sh** on. It means you’ve wished, cursed and swore that you had chosen some other manner to live by. It means you say ‘yes’ when you think ‘oh sh**, that gig sounds like hell’. It means you say ‘yes’ and then that gig actually IS hell. And you then say ‘yes’ again. Still you pursue it.
Boreal forest and reflections in a small kettle pond, Copper River Basin, Wrangell - St. Elias National Park and Preserve, Alaska. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.
Hey Folks,
It’s often said that art can teach us how to live. This is true, yet it’s also commonly misinterpreted. The product of art, what we call the photograph, or the lyric, or the dance, doesn’t teach us how to live. The product of art, these artifacts, can show us how someone ELSE lived.
On the other hand, the making of art (which is REALLY where art is), can teach us how to live.
This process, the making of art, illustrates how we might live; how we might be fully present, engaged, conscious. More fully alive. (more…)
Borwn bear in the forest, fall colors, searching for salmon in a river. Brown bear (Ursus arctos) Katmai National Park and Preserve, Alaska. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.
Hey Folks
A few quick updates: though nothing is ‘final’ on the interwebs, it seems; the internet goes to infinity, I suppose.
The end of every summer/fall I’m busy with office work, paper work, reports, emails, photo editing, processing, prints, website updates, website tweaks, writing, photo submissions (Oh, how I detest that word “submissions”; yet it’s so wonderfully apt, isn’t it?) and heaven knows what else. It’s not so much fun, but (apparently) it has to be done.
Lately, here’s a few of the projects I’ve been dealing with and fires I’ve put out. Many more to come.
A brown bear patrols the river's edge at dawn, searching for spawning Sockeye salmon. Brown bear (Ursus arctos), Katmai National Park and Preserve, Alaska. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.
Hey Folks,
For regular readers here, you might well know of the photo tours and guiding I do with Alaskan Alpine Treks. I’ve just now set up a page to compliment those photo tours here on Skolai Images, and you can be the first to visit by clicking here: Alaska Photo Tours.
I’m currently booking 3 photo tours: the ever popular grizzly bears in the fall tour (2×1 week tours), both of which are almost full for 2012. I’m also booking 2 Alaska aurora borealis photo tours for winter/spring in 2012; March and April. And the Skolai Pass Alaska landscapes backcountry tour is a great summertime trip; July and August seem to be the popular dates for that trip.
You can find all the info you might want, and links and pictures, over on the new Alaska Photo Tours page.
Give me a call or drop me an email if you’re interested. Thanks so much.
Cheers
Carl
View up Arrigetch Creek toward the Arrigetch Peaks, Xanadu, Ariel and Caliban, from left to right. A popular rock climbing and backpacking destination, the Arrigecth Peaks lie in the heart of Alaska's Gates of the Arctic National Park and Preserve, right near the Continental Divide. Arrigetch Peaks, Gates of the Arctic National Park, Alaska. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.
Hey Folks,
You perhaps saw this recent story in the news about our ‘drowning in a sea of images’. It’s an interesting view, and, I believe, a very valid point. Any kind of inundation makes staying afloat a difficult task. And sometimes it’s impossible.
A photographer and artist I admire, Chase Jarvis, recently posted a response to this on his blog, about how we’re not drowning, but getting richer with this unabating torrent of images. That’s kind of a weird take on it. What kind of flood can we swim through?
Chase argues “shouldn’t it be said that we’re not drowning in photography at all, that we’re perhaps getting metaphorically rich off more and more of these veins of gold?”
“veins of gold”? Gold has value because it’s rare. And because it’s durable. If gold were produced quite as readily as iphone “pics” seem to be, and had a similar lifespan of any digital file, it wouldn’t cost eighteen hundred dollars an ounce right now. I’d suggest a better chemical analogy might be carbon dioxide. CO2 seems to be pretty prevalent right now, becoming ever more so, and, contrary to what the s(k)eptics tell ya, it’s not enriching our world. (more…)
A starry night sky falls above Mt. Saint Elias, still glowing in the late evening sun. Stars at night over Mt. St. Elias, Icy Bay, Wrangell - St. Elias National Park and Preserve, Alaska.
Hey Folks,
Sometimes the work of an artist is simply to be persistent; keep at it. Follow through on that little spark of an idea that awakens us at night; pursue that little ‘idea’, no matter how trivial, how distant it seems. That trigger is where art begins. All art.
I suppose this point may be made more clearly in reverse; sometimes it’s easier to simply think ‘yeah, that would be neat’, but never actually follow up when we receive an idea. It’s always too easy to conjure up excuses not to do something, rather than actually take a single step in the direction that calls us; something akin to what they say about evil and good men doing nothing.
As an artist, when you notice that little spark of an idea, that trigger that calls your attention, no matter how briefly, give it your attention; make an effort to follow that story, that path, that rhythm, that idea, and see where it takes you; that journey is what art is. Don’t “do nothing”. (more…)
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This gallery of images is a collection of photographs taken by Carl Donohue. All images on this site remain the property of Carl Donohue Photography and Skolai Images, and are fully protected by federal and international copyright laws. Any unauthorized use is strictly prohibited, and any reproduction copying, manipulation, alteration, saving or distribution of these images will be prosecuted to the full extent of the law. All images are available for licensed use; to do so, please contact Carl via email or phone # (770) 952 4549.
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