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To photograph a tree well

Graham Gall, Sequoia Sempervirens#2

Photography / “Our Forest in Focus”, by Graham Gall. At Rusten Art Centre, Queanbeyan, until February 19. Reviewed by CON BOEKEL.

THERE is a giant Inland Scribbly Gum in the Dryandra Street Woodland.

It was already a tree when Cook skirted the eastern shores of the continent around 250 years ago. When I pass that tree, I pat it. It feels timeless. It was there well before I was born and it will probably be there when I die.

Humans have had a thing about trees for millennia. When we touch wood for luck we connect with our distant ancestors who believed that benign spirits live in trees. We kiss under the mistletoe. We wassail and share gifts by the Christmas tree. We would like a home among the gum trees. In indigenous culture trees have religious significance and are sources of fuel, food, fibre and wood for tools.

Trees often become the epicentres for conflict between conservationists and developers – as in the recent expansion of the National War Memorial. Urban trees moderate climate impacts. Globally, trees are massive carbon sinks. In effect, trees are existential markers for human civilisation.

Canberra’s built and peri-urban environment is pepper-potted with significant trees. It is these trees that are the focus of Gall’s photos. The style is photo-realism informed by Gall’s aesthetics.

Graham Gall, Auracaria#2

It is easy to photograph a tree, but it is a considerable challenge to photograph a tree well. When the trees are chosen for being culturally significant, the technical challenges tend to accumulate. Trees do not arrange themselves in the natural or urban landscape with a view to being photographed. Other plants may obscure the view. The built environment may or may not be arranged to suit. Getting the right vantage point or the right distance from the tree may be difficult. Gall addresses these challenges diligently. I sometimes think that Jeffrey Smart, with a current major exhibition in the National Gallery, was clever to render his cityscapes treeless.

The powerful images are where Gall holds the camera close to the bole and points the camera vertically upwards. He does this, for example, with the “Bunya pine” and the “coast redwood”. This limits the focus to the tree by cropping out any distractions. It gives the subjects an imposing mass. Elsewhere he achieves a pleasing sense of depth as in “burr oak” and “brittle gum” by emphasising avenues rather than individual trees. There is good use of light and shade, as in “burr oak”. There is the traditional tortured, half-dead paddock tree with appropriate atmospheric effects in “yellow box”.

Each image is provided with an explanatory text. These are excellent. The locations are well described and most of the trees are readily accessible to the public. As expected, Weston and Pryor, important figures in the forest history of Canberra, get a mention. There are some unexpected gems. There is a giant Bunya pine planted in 1927 by a previous, perhaps more wholesome, iteration of the Duke of York. There is an ash in a courtyard of Parliament House which is named the “Budget Tree” because it flaunts its autumn colours in the first week of May – the traditional Budget week.

The Rusten Arts Centre is the repurposed old Queanbeyan Hospital. It is set in a century old heritage-listed garden. As I glance through a window from the Reading Room Gallery, which houses the exhibition, I spot a deeply fissured ancient conifer.

The exhibition is presented by the Canberra Tree Network. The intention is to showcase the region’s most spectacular trees. Does the exhibition succeed? For most of the trees, yes. But some of the trees are not spectacular. We will have to be patient. The “dawn redwood” is a sapling. It may well be spectacular in a thousand years. It may live for another two thousand years.

It touches time itself.

 

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Thank you,

Ian Meikle, editor

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2 Responses to To photograph a tree well

ggall7 says: 10 February 2022 at 3:31 pm

Thanks Con and City News Editor for this excellent review. This was a truly collaborative Project I was humbled to be commissioned to shoot for the Canberra Tree Network. I am pleased Con took the time to visit the Exhibition and was able to understand what it takes to photograph trees well. As he says – its not as easy at it may look. Much appreciated.

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Ian Meikle says: 11 February 2022 at 9:57 am

Thanks, Graham. I’m not sure we’ve ever had an artist write in response to a review before. Your comments are appreciated. Lovely photos, too.
Sincerely, Ian Meikle, editor.

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