NY Through the Lens - New York City Photography

Central Park winter landscape. San Remo through snow-covered trees. New York City

Summer’s memories sit suspended like words caught in the throat of winter: stifled, muffled utterances barely able to escape in the form of speech.

But in the wide open expanse of dreams, words take flight as summer’s memories break through the shards of branches conjuring up the outline of buildings and cityscapes on the condensation of winter’s frozen breath.

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Bare branches against a winter sky. Socrates Sculpture Park. Astoria, Queens. New York City.

Stuck somewhere between the heart and lips pushed down by the echoes of memory echoes loss: the mirror reflection of connection.

We spend our lives shedding pieces of ourselves: molted hopes and dreams that slough off into the thoughts of everyone we meet like stardust falling to the Earth from distant stars.

These are the pieces we hold on to: the pieces that are part of us that can never be put back into the same place again after they dissolve into nothing.

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Autumn leaves under elm trees. Central Park, New York City.

Under a canopy of elm trees, nothing is quite as beautiful as the warmth that emanates from fallen autumn leaves.

Scattered like fiery embers, they are strewn about only suspended in motion for a short time before the wind stirs them from their molten slumber.

If winter had but one dream, it would be of this.

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A few people commented elsewhere that they missed both parts of the documentary series that I posted earlier this week. It was part of a docu-series filmed this past summer about my photography. So, if you missed it and are curious about my early influences and thoughts about New York City, here are both segments:

Art Seen: Vivienne Gucwa

Art Seen: Vivienne Gucwa, Part 2

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Autumn sunset. Central Park, New York City.

In autumn, sun drips down like melted gold on tree limbs decorated in the finest foliage.

The earth, chilled by the memory of winter, holds onto the sun’s light with hands outstretched as each ray slips through its fingers like fine sand.

As bitingly cool air brushes past flushed faces, every bit of sunlight clings to the earth like embers fallen from a powerful fire.

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I love the brisk quality of light in the autumn especially in the evenings. It’s as if the sun is trying to penetrate through past winter all the way forward into spring.

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Bow Bridge in autumn. Central Park, New York City.

The sun’s light dances on the tops of leaves blushing red in autumn’s embrace.

And the earth glows remembering summer’s long days and endless promises of warmth.

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This is one of the first round of photos I took back when I started to seriously take photos. I go back to this photo every year around this time and think a lot about that day, almost exactly two years ago to this date.

The air was bitingly crisp and the leaves had barely started to fall from the trees. I didn’t really know what I was trying to capture. In reality, I remember thinking that I would be happy if I could just get the colors of the leaves right with my humble camera (it was a point and shoot that barely had any controls), I would be over the moon.

This image has gone on quite a few journeys: as prints to many people (it still remains, to this day, one of my most popular), to clients for commercial work in ads, and on various websites.

I used to beat myself up about this photo since it feels like I have traveled a large distance in photography since I first took it and I can obviously see in my mind how the scene would look if I had taken the photo now.

I didn’t know it back then but what I have found to be most valuable element of photography is the ability to capture unique moments and distill their essence into something that resonates in some way with even as little as one person (which could just be yourself).

And you know what? I have gone back to this spot hundreds of times since then and I have never once seen it look exactly like this again.

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Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux designed Central Park in 1858. Bow Bridge, shaped like an archer’s bow, was built between 1859 and 1862. It spans more than 60 feet of the Lake. The ornamental iron railing incorporates elements of Gothic, Neo-Classical, and Renaissance design.

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Autumn in Central Park, New York City - on ABC News!

ABC News contacted me to ask if they could use one of my autumn photos in an autumn photo feature on the official ABC News website and I said yes. The feature just went up here:

When Autumn Comes To…

Pretty sweet! Super excited to share this (and re-post this photo in light of this news). It’s one of my favorite photos that I have ever taken here in Central Park in the autumn. I actually posted about it a week or so ago here:

Autumn Leaves - New York City

This all has me craving pumpkin pie or pumpkin spice hot chocolate! :)

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Piles of autumn leaves under trees during autumn in Central Park, New York City.

All I can think about at this point is anything and everything that has to do with autumn: piles of leaves to jump in, hot apple cider with cinnamon sticks, pumpkin in just about everything, cute scarves and socks, ducking into cozy places to warm up briefly before heading back out to enjoy the kiss of brisk autumn breezes.

Summer, we can always fall in love again next year.

For now, I have a huge crush on autumn.

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Central Park autumn landscape overlooking the lake and San Remo.

There are days in Central Park during the autumn when the weather is deliciously ominous. These are the sorts of days when grey clouds do their best to compete with the sunlight for the spotlight. I love the quality of this sort of contrasting light. During moments when the sun does manage to peek through the gray blanket of clouds, the foliage seems to reel in the bits of scattered sunlight.

This is a vista that seems to come alive in the autumn and winter due in part to Central Park’s beautiful willow trees. There is a quality to the placement of the branches that is reminiscent of theatrical stage curtains in a persistent state of dramatically opening to reveal the landscapes that are just beyond their grasp as if they are revealing a show that comes alive in the final two acts of a performance that spans a year.

In the autumn, these sorrow-soaked branches frame the sprawling autumn landscape that surrounds the lake and in the winter when the lake is covered in snow, the same branches hold multitudes of icy tears framing the towers of San Remo perfectly.

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Autumn. Central Park, New York City.

The graceful limbs of Autumn’s trees cling to all of Summer’s sunsets searing their leaves yellow, orange and red with the sun’s heat.

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Afternoon rain. Pell Street. Chinatown, New York City.

Looking through the bleary-eyed clouds that fill the sky above, the cracks of the city’s streets and sidewalks stretch across its body like wrinkles on well-worn skin while street signs and buildings melt into each other pouring themselves into a river of colors.

And in the twilight of the afternoon’s memories, the sky’s tears fall.

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Autumn - Central Park, New York City.

That chill in the air wrapping itself around trees like an overflowing scarf , the crispness on the breeze chilling faces with its autumn kisses, trees displaying their decorated limbs in golden shades of serenity: Autumn.

Cinnamon sticks resting languidly in steaming mugs of hot apple cider, pumpkin-orange colored wishes carried on the scent of firewood, frosted sighs of contentment exhaled in long cool breaths, leaves sounding their crackled whispers of surrender, earth reeling from summer preparing for its long engagement with the snow-covered proclamations of winter: Autumn.

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The New York City skyline from above looking north.

The sun dances slow with the skyscrapers of the New York City skyline in the summer as the clouds kiss the horizon and haze emanates from the collective heat of these intimate encounters.

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I love viewing the New York City skyline in late summer. While the visibility is often limited due to the haze, there is something really exquisite in the way that the foreground skyscrapers appear in this sort of view.

This particular view is facing north. On the right side of the image, notable skyscrapers that can be seen are the Chrysler Building and the MetLife building (which stands over Grand Central Terminal). 30 Rock and Rockefeller Center can be seen straight ahead looking out over Central Park and the buildings that line Central Park West. On the left side of the image, a notable skyscraper that can be seen in this view is the Bank of America Tower (with the pointy tip) which stands next to the green MetLife building and overlooks Bryant Park.

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Coney Island beach at sunset. Brooklyn, New York City.

The sun whispers to the ocean in golden-voiced tones on evenings like these.

Summer’s warmth falls onto the bare skin of the earth as the air is punctuated by the sounds of distant laughter and birds.

And the city fades into the haze like a nostalgic thought carried away by an all too familiar melody.

I had a bit of a camera tragedy a few weeks back. My beloved Sony SLT-A55 stopped working. It’s currently being looked at by Sony and I have had the pleasure of using a Sony SLT-A77 (the image in this post was taken with it) as a loaner camera until the end of the month which has been nothing short of magical. I plan on doing a write-up later this week regarding how the Sony SLT- A55 compares to the Sony SLT- A77.

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Bow Bridge in the snow. Central Park winter. New York City.

In the silent stillness of winter the world stops rotating temporarily.

All sound, speech and thought is muffled as the earth slumbers briefly under a blanket of freshly fallen snow.

In each snowflake rest the hopes and dreams of all who have ever felt the warmth of an anticipatory heart-flutter: dream-sputters that wrap the earth in the weight of their desires.

Built between 1859 and 1862, Bow Bridge is one of Central Park’s most iconic structures. This image was taken during a snowstorm in Central Park, New York City.

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Looking out over New York City rooftops. Chelsea and Midtown Manhattan.

The city is comprised of so many tiny urban worlds: planets and stars that inhabit a larger universe. Until I understood that fact about New York City, I couldn’t properly begin to understand how to explore it.

When you spend your days looking out of any number of windows in a city as large as New York City, the urban world seems to shrink to include only the views that you are accustomed to seeing on a regular basis.

Therefore, when you come across a view that takes you out of your small urban frame of reference and plants you outside of that view and outside of yourself for a few moments, it’s a bit like finally coming to an understanding that the world you inhabit daily is just part of a larger picture.

And as your universe expands when you stand on a rooftop gazing out onto the planets and stars that populate its view, pieces of you expand along with it and you are changed forever.

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