Marcia Johnson
Artist's Statement
At the entrance to an exhibit that opened sometime in the 1970's or 1980's at the Field Museum was a display containing two huge photographs -- one of a snail shell and one of the edge of a razor blade.
The intention of the display was to show that the closer you look at manmade objects, the less perfect they appear, but the closer you look at things in nature, the more perfect they appear. The photos showed the edge of the razor blade as a jagged rim and the snail shell as an intricate pattern of curved lines forming a perfect spiral. Those images have been with me all these years.
When I was asked what I would be photographing as my self-assignment, I thought of that huge snail shell and decided to do some independent photo research with a macro lens into the amazing perfection of shells. I was so lucky! In my class was Joanna McCaffery (whose lovely photos appeared in our last show) who works at the Field and is a friend of Jochen Gerber -- Collection Manager, Zoology-Invertebrates at the Field. Mr. Gerber most kindly allowed me to spend hours photographing specimens from the Field's vast collection of rare and beautiful shells -- each bearing its own identifying number. The numbers appear on some of the shells in my photographs. Many thanks to you both.
What a project! I loved taking my photos but I had a devil of a time as a macro photographer trying to get a handle on the depth of field problems one encounters with macro photography. All my photos were "soft." With the expert help of LeJean, Marcus and Richard - and the help and moral support of my classmates -- I persevered and, at least in some cases, won my battle with depth of field. A few of my "successes" are shown here.
I think it can be agreed that there is such great beauty in these natural "gems" that one could continue to photograph them for a long time without any loss of interest.
I plan to do just that.
