Terra Galleria Photography

Archive for the ‘Esthetics’ Category

The Trouble with Wilderness

Finding meaning often begins with crafting a personal narrative. When we shape our experiences into stories, we discover clarity, purpose, and a deeper connection to ourselves. With that in mind, while reflecting on my work in landscape photography, I realized that its development mirrored the historic evolution of the genre, and also of environmentalism. I’ve […]

Landscapes where I Live, Monochrome vs. Color

After chasing the light and seasons in national parks across the country, a few months ago I released the first installment of a new body of work: twenty-five landscape photographs made where I live, which means in public lands within half an hour from home. This follow-up presents twenty-five more monochrome images from that body […]

QT Luong chapter in “Landscape Photography – American Master Photographers on Their Art”

In 2015, the China Photographic Publishing House released the book Landscape Photography – American Master Photographers on Their Art, featuring the work of nine American photographers (in order of appearance): Art Wolfe, Charles Cramer, David Muench, Clyde Butcher, QT Luong, Tom Till, Tom Murphy, Elizabeth Carmel, and Ian Plant. Since it was about studying how […]

Landscapes where I Live, in Monochrome

At last, I am releasing a body of work featuring landscape photographs made where I live, which means within half an hour from home. And if that wasn’t enough of a change in the practice of someone known for large-format photography of national parks and other public lands all around the country – itself a […]

Seeking Lee Friedlander’s Signature

We joke that if my wife had a haircut, I would not be able to recognize her. But I did well in identifying Lee Friedlander. His facial features had not changed that much since the year 1994 when he took his self-portrait in Tokyo, which was prominently displayed in the gallery. Besides, he was the […]

Are Composite Photographs Truthful?

Assembling parts of two or more images into a photograph is a long-established technique that I have occasionally used for technical purposes. This piece looks at the history of composite photographs and details my own approach to composites. Finding my own finished photographs composited into a new one in a USA Pavilion Expo exhibit was […]

White Sands Dusk: Film versus Digital

My only goal for the afternoon of December 20, 2019, was to make one photograph that I had been working towards since I arrived at White Sands National Monument, two days before: the ocean of white dunes colored by soft light of dusk, on the evening it would redesignated the 62th national park. It would […]

Indiana Dunes National Park: Chicago Tonight, Final Spreads and Thoughts

Chicago Tonight I was honored that WTTW, the Chicago area’s PBS affiliate which is one of the most-watched public television stations in the country, aired a story about my visit to the Indiana Dunes, produced by multiple Emmy-winning Jay Shefsky. The four-minute Chicago Tonight piece, which is very accurate, took about two hours to film […]

Gateway Arch National Park Image Selection Poll Results and Thoughts

In a previous post, I asked you for input in choosing the Gateway Arch National Park photograph to be included in the Treasured Lands exhibit. Back then, I did not comment on the images in order not to influence answers, so here are my thoughts, together with the poll results. Poll results Thank you to […]

Which is the Best Photo of Horsetail Fall Firefall?

I wrote previously about finding a new view of Horsetail Fall, Yosemite “natural firefall”. The high vantage point let me frame the waterfall in a rich wide-angle composition that brought me much satisfaction. But would most people consider it to be “better” than the classic photograph? What would their relative preferences say? On the day […]