ARTIST'S STATEMENT
Salt Marsh, Cape Cod 2006-2008
Each of the last three summers I’ve traveled to Cape Cod in
Massachusetts to spend a couple of weeks photographing in the salt marshes of the Cape Cod National Seashore. I was first attracted to the swamp by its aesthetic riches – the wavy mats of marsh hay (thick enough for me to walk on and keep me from sinking into the muck below); the scattered tidal pools tucked into the tall marsh grasses; the saltwater of the rising tide inching through the dark plants, reflecting the still-bright sky at dusk.
Little did I know at these first visits, but I have found out in my research since, that I was witnessing an alarming dying-off of the salt marshes on Cape Cod and elsewhere in the eastern United States. The cause of this degradation is still not clear to scientists, but the plant life in salt marshes, one of the most productive ecosystems on earth, is now seriously threatened. A few pictures of mine show evidence of this where you see wide swaths of mud, instead of growing plants, at water’s edge.
When I return to the salt marshes on Cape Cod next summer, a new
awareness of the fragility of the swamp’s life-processes should inform
and enrich the beauty of the photographs I make.