Fritz Liedtke fine art photography

The Way We Look

Photographs by Fritz Liedtke

In the summer of 2000, in a time of personal need, I sought a place to pray and think clearly. Going to the Grotto, a park near my home designated for just such activity, I was disappointed to find it overrun with tourists. People with cameras--sometimes 2 or 3 dangling from their necks--roamed the several acre wooded gardens, talking, snapping, goofing around, irreverent and incoherent. This disturbed and grieved me.
The question plagued me for days: "Why is there no reverence, no respect, no consciousness of place? Why are beautiful places considered useful for their entertainment value alone, another experience to be consumed?" I decided to return with my own camera. To record irreverence, irreverently.
The project expanded, growing to include other sites--in the Columbia River Gorge and Mt. St. Helens--where respect and reverence also seemed lacking. Where cameras abound, I discovered, sight diminishes. People walk in, take a snapshot, and leave. I wanted to capture this mentality, ironically, on film.
Yet I also found that some people do come and pay attention. I found that those who see, stay. And many of the most intriguing images are of those who are able to be still in the midst of the tourist hubbub: seeing, staying, reverent.
Thus, this body of work is about the way we see, and the way we are seen: the way we look.
Images in this series were captured on 35mm film; finished prints (11"x14") are hand-printed on Fuji Crystal Archive paper, and are available for $250 each.