What is nature? The dictionary definition of nature is ‘the phenomena of the physical world collectively, including plants, animals, the landscape, and other features and products of the earth, as opposed to humans or human creations’.
And culture? The dictionary definition is two-fold:
1. the arts and other manifestations of human intellectual achievement regarded collectively.
2. . the customs, arts, social institutions, and achievements of a particular nation, people, or other social group. (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/culture)
The desire to preserve nature is as old as civilization and can be observed by studying some of Western Civilization’s oldest cultures, as seen in the literature from the Homeric hymns of Ancient Greece:
“firs or towering oaks grow upon the fruitful earth
beautiful, flourishing on the lofty mountains.
They stand high, and people call them
sacred groves of the immortals,
and mortals do not cut them down at all with an axe.”
(https://www.canadiangeographic.ca/article/history-behind-canadas-national-parks
There was a period as seen in Classicism, where mankind was viewed as superior to nature and could exert its power over it, but this was short lived with the rise of Romanticism towards the end of the 18th Century.
Romanticists such as Henry David Thoreau believed that humans were meant to live in the world of nature, rather than the urban world and he sought isolation and nearness to nature. In his writings, Thoreau suggests that all living things have rights that humans should recognize, implying that we have a responsibility to respect and care for nature rather than destroying it. Thoreau proclaims, “Every creature is better alive than dead, men, moose and pine-trees, and he who understands it will rather preserve its life than destroy it”. (Neimark, Peninah, and Peter Rhoades Mott. 1999. TheEnvironmental Debate: A Documentary History. Westport: Greenwood Press, p94).
The connection between Romanticism and nature was largely formed with this core concept that man's true self can be found in the wilderness, rather than in the city. Both artists and philosophers of the Romantic period emphasized the glory and beauty of nature, and the power of the natural world. (https://thewandererliteraryjournal.wordpress.com/2015/12/11/thoreau-on-nature-in-walden).
Henry David Thoreau is considered by many to be the environmental father of the green movement. As teacher, scientist, historian, student, author, and naturalist, Thoreau has made a number of contributions to the ecological movement, his most significant including his own personal published reflections on conservation and his search for the meaning of life through the relationship he had with nature. (https://thewandererliteraryjournal.wordpress.com/2015/12/11/thoreau-on-nature-in-walden/
Mueller, Dawna. 2017. Altmann
Photography’s relationship with nature can be seen from its early days of inception. Both William Fox Talbot and Louis Daguerre were in a race to create the first photographic prototype, and while they were competitors in business they both shared a vision of a new image making process as one that originates in and takes form through nature itself. (Keenan, Hagi. 2020. California. Stanford University Press, p15). In fact, Daguerre had prepared a promotional prospectus for his invention in 1938, a year before he introduced the Daguerreotype, as ‘a discovery that consists of the spontaneous reproduction of the images of nature received in the camera obscura….The Daguerreotype is not a tool for drawing nature; it is a chemical and physical process that gives the facility to reproduce herself. (Daguerre, Louis Jacques. 1838. Daguerreotype: Prospectus, Second Half of 1838, in First Exposures Writings from the Beginning of Photography. 2017. Siegel, Steffen. Los Angeles. Getty Publications. Pgs 34-37).
These sentiments seemed to be a central theme of Talbots work as well which appears in the first photography book he published called ‘The Pencil of Nature’ in 1884. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pencil_of_Nature)
Photography’s historical roots in nature perpetuate to this day as seen in the plethora of both hobby and professional photographers photographing nature in one form or another.
How we view nature today in the 21 Century varies from culture to culture and also within the spheres of any give culture; one’s perspective is based on the subjectivity of one’s own lens. In a semiotic analysis, it is through the plurality of discourses that we use. When a culture has hardly any food to feed its population, caring for nature and land conservation will undoubtedly be low on its list of priorities. Whereas, developed nations with large tracks of unpopulated nature are seemingly more interested in protecting these lands for future generations.
Mueller, Dawna. 2017. Svalbard
Nature, historically has experienced the dichotomy of perspectives, on the one hand viewed as a place for human consumption, using the land and its treasures as the bounty for earthly pleasures, sustenance and shelter. Both the land and oceans have been at the mercy of the pillage. And in contrast, it is seen as a refuge in need of protection as seen in the advent of national park protections developed in the 20th century. (https://www.canadiangeographic.ca/article/history-behind-canadas-national-parks)
I share Thoreau sentiments that we have a right to respect nature and not destroy it. And that includes all living things that reside in nature whether it is land or marine.
Mueller, Dawna. 2018. Svalbard
The advent of Industrialization has seen an increase in practices that are at odds with the preservation of nature. Depicting the industrial sublime has become a focus for Edward Burtynsky whose large-scale photographs of industry and the scars that remain combine issues of ecology and the role of visual media. His work focuses on resource extraction and the role of the commodity in the way this alters our landscape. He doesn’t photograph the natural disasters that are happening in nature, rather, he photographs what is referred to as the ‘slow violence’ perpetrated on eco-stystems. (Shuster, Joshua. 2013. Between Manufacturing and Landscapes: Edward Burtynsky and the Photography of Ecology. Photography & Culture Vol 6, Issue 2. Pgs 194-196). Burtynsky’s work is the antithesis of the beautiful or the picturesque and entrenched firmly in the sublime, showing nature in a state of destruction. This conceptual shift has provided viewers with perspective that allows one to be ‘pierced by the punctum’ to use Barthes vernacular. (Barthes, Roland. 1982. Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography. London: Jonathan Capes).
https://www.cultframe.com/wp-content/uploads/edward_burtynsky-alberta_oil_sands-1.jpg
Nature is both resilient and fragile, with an ability to flourish in homeostasis and a resounding ability to rebound in the face of adversity. Nature provides humanity with the opportunity for life and without it we cease to exist. From the oxygen provided from the forests to the plant life that nourishes our bodies, nature is our lifeblood to living.
This historical overview is important for my practice because I have chosen to focus on landscape photography as my genre and desire to focus on an aspect of nature that is meaningful to me. I am drawn to the confluence of humans and nature , and I am moved by the adverse affects that humanity has impacted on the natural world and the physical manifestations that result from this. My practice requires me to be on location where ‘place’ features in my work and the visual is the narrative. I am trying to find ways to deepen the narrative and move past the myopic pictorialistic way of capturing the landscape. I want to convey through the visual narrative without an overt aestheticization of the subject. I want my images to create a dialogue, but I realize that once it leaves my hands, the image is firmly in the domain of the viewer. I am cognizant of the fact that while the intended studium is observed, the punctum’s effect is no longer in my control. (Barthes, Roland. 1982. Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography. London: Jonathan Capes).
Mueller, Dawna. 2018. Svalbard
While it is true as Susan Sontag writes, ‘photos furnish evidence’ she also suggests that ‘taking photographs has set up a chronic voyeuristic relation to the world which levels the meaning of all events. (Sontag, Susan. 1978. On Photography. London. Allen Lane. P4,10). With that in mind, I continue to find ways to create and hope that some meaning from my work is derived. As David Bate concludes, ‘Landscape is not all things to all people, but a highly differentiated discourse on representing space.’ (Bate, David. 2009. Photography: The Key Concepts. UK. MPG Books Group)