In 1980 I spent the winter traveling around Europe. My trip was shaped by a hunt for photography and art. It is here that the fragments of this project began to come together in my brain. It was in the Tate Gallery that I saw one of Emile Nolde (one of my favorite artist) paintings of the ocean. He was living on the island of Sylt off the northern coast of Germany. It was one of a series of seascapes which he labeled A thru F. The idea of exploring the changing sea fascinated me and I had an island to live on.

At the same time I was reading a book Landscape into Art by Kenneth Clark. I don’t remember much about the book, but I do remember an idea it spawned. I began to think about horizon lines. I worked the idea of clear sharp horizons. Then I thought of hazy unclear ones. Where should the horizon fall in the picture? Top, middle or bottom. These were thoughts gathering in my head as I wandered and photographed my way around the continent.

I also had a fascination with the painter Monet. His ability to pull out colors that ordinary eyes miss. I thought that there was a secret world of color out there and we can see it if we open ourselves to an awareness of it. If ask what is the color of the sky, one would answer blue. What is the color of your jeans? Blue. What is the color of the ocean? Blue. None of these things are anywhere near the same color. Our language limits our perceptions. I thought that if I got past the language and experienced what I saw then the world of colors would be open to me. That is what Ocean / Sky is about. It is about seeing the colors that are here. Avoid the labels and experience the light and color of the natural world.

I made a series of photographs on Block Island around this time. They were taken with my 4x5 view camera. From my back porch I could look out over the old Ocean View Property. It was a large hotel that burned down in 1966. It was an easy walk to a cliff that over looked the ocean. I took six photographs of the exact same view, but under different light conditions. It included the beach, a large wooden box, ocean and sky. I liked the differences in light and color that the ocean and sky delivered.

I am not sure when I started this project. I know that the first photographs were taken on color film. This probably places the start in the late 80s or early 90s. Many of these early photographs in the series were never printed. There were always more interesting things to print. It seemed that a minimalist photograph of the ocean and sky was not that compelling. Essentially, this is true. The strength of these images does not come by the individual photograph. It is the group in proximity to each other that gives the work its energy and power.

I do not know how many photographs I have taken of just the ocean and sky. Well over a thousand for sure. Many of the photographs are from Block Island, but not all of them. Anytime I came near to the ocean I took some for the project. Unlike most of my projects there was no clear beginning or end to this one. I took the pictures and then forgot about them. It wasn’t until being trapped by the pandemic of 2020 did I even put them together in one folder on the computer. It was at that moment that I realized that this work had actually uncovered what I wanted it to do. I had to see them all together to find meaning. The love of light and color. The moods of the ocean. The space and energy.