People Like Us, Places Like Ours

The Hotchkiss School’s Tremaine Gallery opens the season with “Perspectives:  Where We Live,†presenting 11 local photographers ­— some of national renown — displaying images of people and places in the Berkshires and Litchfield Hills. All are of professional quality; some are splendid.

   Joseph Meehan is so obsessed with light that he includes quotes about it within his works. His lovely “Lake Sunrise†includes the great Garry Winograd’s perplexing statement, “Photos have no narrative content. They only describe light on a surface.†Surely this is true of Meehan’s images: glorious shots of “Rays of Light†or “Lake Mist,†which ravish the eye and spirit but do not engage the mind to wonder about character or story.

   But Winograd’s pictures, ironically, always told stories, like those the mind imagines while viewing Anne Day’s remarkable portraits:  a wary mother and daughter; a stoical boy in a marvelous, fur-lined winter cap with great ear flaps; the pensive and melancholy young woman seen through a rain-spattered window. Or those in a magical allée of trees in Salisbury or in — my favorite — a gorgeous shot of a white house, trees and a wet, imperfect road leading somewhere out of sight, all seen in hazy, filtered light.

   Bill Binzen’s pieces fall mostly in the light and beauty category. But a charming shot of of sulky racing in Salisbury when it was still done begs for narrative. (And his photo of Mount Riga from 1972 is the earliest shot in the show.)

   George Shattuck’s penchant for hazy, out-of-focus shots that produce lovely impressionistic prints may resonate emotionally for some. Not much for me.

   Peter Peirce is best known for his architectural and residential interiors photography. And he brings that sensibility to some compelling, angular, beautifully composed shots of factories and industries. “Berkshire Mountain Distillers, Inc.†is about form and bright color, and so is “Lindell Fuels.†They are busy shots, but never out of control.

   Tom Zetterstrom’s 12 little gelatin silver prints are all of trees but not all from our neck of the woods. Beginning with Connecticut oaks in 1978 and ending with a limber pine in Donner Pass, CA, in 2005, Zetterstrom delivers a series in blacks, grays, browns and whites that emphasize tree geometry and architecture. Seeming slight at first, they become more substantial the longer you spend with them.

   Christina Lane is showing five portraits of great skill and nuance. While the stories of these sitters are more contained and composed than Anne Day’s spontaneous outbursts, they are clearly there for us to discover. Both Sandra and Robert Haiko are in the show. Her “Untitled, From Scarecrow Series†is a ghostly, autumnal composition hand-colored on a gelatin silver print. Robert Haiko’s “Tree and Box Car†— the rusty red rail car behind a leafless tree — is almost palpable, while “Pool Scene and Tall Grass†fools the eye.

   The oddest work is from Jonathan Doster of Sharon. Clearly a talented and artistic photographer with an inclination for the surreal in much of his spectacularly colored other work, Doster has chosen to exhibit three archival prints on canvas which — paradoxically — manage to look both self-consciously artsy and like cheap reproductions. And he has priced them pretentiously:  $1,303.30 to $1,555.55. Cute, maybe, in a teenager; understandable, perhaps, in Dali; just silly in Doster.  He is a lot better than he is showing us.

     “Perspectives†runs at the Tremaine Hotchkiss Gallery through Oct. 16, with an opening reception for the photographers on Sept. 11, from 4 to 6 p.m. Gallery hours are Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Sunday, noon to 4 p.m.  Call 860-435-4423 or go to www.hotchkiss.org/arts for more information.