Was delighted to see selections from my Color is a Verb included in David Nightingale’s soon to be released book Extreme Exposures, Advanced Techniques for Creative Digital Photography.

The book, published by Ilex Press out of East Sussex, England, covers a vast array of traditional and innovative techniques for capturing images in a variety of situations and will be available September 2010.

As a body of work Color is a Verb has deep personal importance for me. What began as a personal project for my husband continues to evolve as a series of vibrant interpretive images of nature that quickly became popular. But that’s how art happens sometimes—unexpectedly—and it doesn’t always wait for you to catch up.

As the series has developed, my approach to each individual image has changed. I spend a great deal more time pre-visualizing each shot with a more defined expectation than in the earliest captures. But the truth is with a technique like this, controlling the outcome to any great degree is virtually impossible. So I have to be satisfied with the execution of my intent and stay open to the idea that art can have its own energies.

Each month a selection from my abstract Color is a Verb series is available as a desktop wallpaper. You can add this file to your screensaver folder and have it rotate among other images you collect.

June is the official first month of summer where I live. Summer brings thoughts of lazy afternoons spent floating at the lake.

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Here are some other terrific photographers who offer free images for you to enjoy. Treat yourself and have a look – they’re all quite stunning and very unique in subject matter and vision.

David du Chemin
Matt Brandon
Younes Bounhar
Gavin Gough

Each month a selection from my abstract Color is a Verb series is available as a desktop wallpaper. You can add this file to your screensaver folder and have it rotate among other images you collect.

May is all about oft blue skies and vibrant yellow greens of new growth. May can be a real tease here in Vermont – it whispers summer warmth but sometimes with a cool hush.

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Here are some other terrific photographers who offer free images for you to enjoy. Treat yourself and have a look – they’re all quite stunning and very unique in subject matter and vision.

David du Chemin
Matt Brandon
Younes Bounhar
Gavin Gough

Does anything speak springtime more than pink? The delicate softness of the season is just marvelous.

Download 1920 x 1280
Download 1280 x 853

Here are some other terrific photographers who offer free images for you to enjoy. Treat yourself and have a look – they’re all quite stunning and very unique in subject matter and vision.

David du Chemin
Matt Brandon
Younes Bounhar
Gavin Gough

March, in like a lion and out like a lamb. March is a blustery month of wind and breezes. This selection, Dance, reminds me of the swirl of mornings in March.

Download 1920 x 1280
Download 1280 x 853

Here are some other terrific photographers who offer free images for you to enjoy. Treat yourself and have a look – they’re all quite stunning and very unique in subject matter and vision.

David du Chemin
Matt Brandon
Younes Bounhar
Gavin Gough

Read more about Color is a Verb.

This series was assembled and published in book form.

View More Color is a Verb Images

Here’s the book’s preface:

Each spring, (speaking generously of late April in Vermont) my husband, Jack, roams around our property checking for hopeful new sprouts.

Often I join him on these ritual treasure hunts and can’t help but relive the thrill of childhood Easter egg hunting. Each small find is a joyous prize.

We exhale a faint but relieving sigh at the reassuring sighting of those first Tulip and Daffodil leaves poking up through the soil. They’re like rebellious children sticking out green tongues – laughing at the passing of another Vermont winter. It’s then we begin to anticipate the glory of what’s to come. Every year it’s like something new.

As summer arrives and other garden alumni return for the season-long reunion, Jack can usually be found somewhere amidst these colorful companions. I often watch from the kitchen window while he weeds and waters, or transplants and prunes, or sometimes just sits in appreciation. It’s a joy to watch him garden in his garden.

It occurred to me during one of my kitchen window spying sessions that what Jack does in the gardens is not unlike what he does in his life. He actively helps others grow and achieve what they were meant to achieve. In doing this he makes the surroundings more vital and rich, and he does it with a direct no-nonsense approach that isn’t demanding or fussy. It’s more like an agreement. “I will make you space to do it; all you have to do is your best. Deal?” And he does this quietly without fanfare. Yes, he frowns over the occasional failure, the plant that wasn’t quite hearty enough for the climate, or one that needed more water or sun. Then he redirects his focus back to the success of the whole. And the successes are many. The successes tend to self-propagate.

I realized that the action of his living, the way he gardens in his gardens, is in many ways a far more tangible and valuable resource than any specific result or flower. There’s a benefit simply in his involvement, in the motion, that’s hard to pin down. It’s ever-changing, sometimes fleeting and often replaced by a new action. It’s alive.

So when I went out to photograph some of the plants he’d planted I wanted to do it in such a way that would represent the broader impact they have in our lives. To do this I chose to color with the colors and in doing so experienced a wonderful journey of adventure and discovery of my own. The results of which are collected here. The intense color and movement on the following pages are as close as I could get to capturing the energy, beauty and vitality of Jack’s gardens.

These photos were all taken during the summer of 2008 (and now 2009 too!). Using a small aperture and long shutter speed I was able to transform the flowers into something besides the petals and stems they normally appear to be. By sweeping across the flowers as the picture was being taken and painting with the camera this way I became keenly aware that color, a wonderful thing to behold, is also a verb.

So is love.