Figure 1 – Claude Monet, “The Magpie,” from the Wikimedia Commons. Original in the MUsee D’Orsay and in the public domain in the United States.

As I said yesterday, time is flying and I am behind on everything.  I have indicated before that my favorite photography magazine is LensWork.  Nothing, in my opinion, beats it at present.  With most photomags you find that the photographer’s website offers better reproductions than the magazine.  In the case of LensWork it can go the other way, and I think that this is a real compliment to the effort and, frankly dedication to image, that they put into it.  I find that I am now an issue behind with LensWork, just like View Camera.  But I digress!

A few weeks ago I found in LensWork the truly glorious and amazing work of photographer Andrea Stone.  I was happy to find that these images could also be seen on “The Stone Photography” website, which Andrea shares with her husband Rob Stone.  As a result I can share them with you.

Ms. Stone relates her transformative moment as being drawn to Claude Monet’s work “The Magpie,” and with that to the realization of what an image can be.  She has made a study of city scapes reflected in distorted patterns in window glasses. But such a description is really way to mechanical, because what she has created is in itself transformation. It bridges photography with impressionist art, creating magical pictures that could just as easily be paintings.  When the building doing the reflecting is by architect Frank Gehry, the end result is simply amazing!  Looking at her work is one of those great wow moments, when you just fall in love with photography all over again.

Ms. Stone loves cities like Portland, OR, where there is a delicate mixture of the antique and classic with the new and modern.  She relates the challenges of photographing buildings in a post 9/11 world, where the photographer is challenged for her interest in a particular building.  And then there is the challenge of light that all photographers face.  The fact that you can return on a second day to the same observing spot, at the same time of day, and under identical weather conditions and the reflection will be altogether different.  It is like a reminder that we move in both space and time and can never truly return to the same spot.