Wild & Scenic Pennsylvania - Hardcover

Robert Hutchinson

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 156313943X ISBN 13: 9781563139437

Publisher: Browntrout Publishers, 2004

Synopsis

Pennsylvania has, acre for acre, the most varied scenery of all the states in the Union. Even though it accounts for scarcely one percent of the total area of the lower forty-eight states, the Keystone State includes within its borders portions almost a third of all the landform provinces in the nation. Anybody who doubts the significance of this measure of the abundance and diversity of Pennsylvania’s natural features has only to leaf through this portfolio of two hundred full-color photographs by master landscape photographer Steve Mulligan to be convinced of the open hand with which nature has endowed this state.

Mulligan spent four years seeking out just the right places and subjects to portray natural Pennsylvania in all its diversity. Like a Mason or Dixon freed from the compulsion of the straight line, Mulligan has tirelessly trekked uphill and down dale, feeling with his feet and probing with his eye the rock-ribbed, forest-clad lineaments of "Penn’s Woods". Seeking out the most subtle and most spectacular photographic subjects in each of Pennsylvania’s varied landscapes, Mulligan has assembled for Wild & Scenic Pennsylvania images from every section of every physical province in the state.

Steve Mulligan’s photographs are systematically grouped into the twenty-three sections of Pennsylvania’s seven landscape provinces, whose picturesque charms are explained by reference to their violent origins in a lively and informative text by naturalist Robert Hutchinson. In the photographer’s introduction, Mulligan touches on the artistic and emotional springs that have sustained him on his long and revelatory trip through WILD & SCENIC PENNSYLVANIA.

About this title

From the Inside Flap:

"When I first began some years ago to consider the possibility of trying my hand at a comprehensive photographic survey of Pennsylvania’s wild and scenic landscape, I was daunted. The project seemed hubristic at worst, unwieldy at best. How could one paladin photographer, with only a finite career in which to do the job, set off to find the best exemplars of each of the state’s many landscape styles and shoot them in all seasons and weathers? How could one individual, no matter how industrious, hope to adequately represent a subject as complex and protean as a 45,000-square-mile tract on which 12,335,000 experts on local landscape live? Without arriving at satisfactory theoretical answers to these questions, I hit the road with the best set of maps I could find and just did what came naturally—followed my trained instinct for beauty. I leave it to 12,335,000 experts to judge if my instinctive method worked."

Steve Mulligan writes this confession and appeal in the photographer’s preface to Wild & Scenic Pennsylvania. In point of fact, Mulligan has no cause to worry that his scattershot approach to shooting Pennsylvania might have missed the mark. The rounded and insightful portrait of Pennsylvania composed by the two hundred photographs in this book testifies to the uncanny accuracy of the Mulligan method.

One of this country’s premier landscape photographers, Mulligan dedicated four years of his career to assembling this panoramic portrait of the natural state of the State of Pennsylvania. Wherever his peregrinations took him—whether by wheel, heel, keel, or wing, whether tramping Penn’s Woods, wading Penn’s Waters, scaling Penn’s Mountains, or banking Penn’s Clouds—Mulligan always scouted out those sweet spots to plant his tripod where he could best ripen the images of the land budding in his brain. Wild & Scenic Pennsylvania is the cornucopia of the choicest fruit of Mulligan’s labors in the field.

Despite his modest prefatory disclaimer, Mulligan has relied as much on scientific system as on inspired chance to put this book together. He carefully charted his field campaign to ensure optimal coverage of the landscape diversity of Pennsylvania—the state with the greatest landscape diversity in the Union. Pennsylvania is divided by scientists into seven landform provinces. These seven provinces are subdivided into twenty-three landform sections. Mulligan has organized his Wild & Scenic Pennsylvania portfolio to represent not only all seven of Pennsylvania’s landform provinces but all twenty-three of Pennsylvania’s landform sections. Pennsylvania’s landform provinces are described in a stimulating introduction by naturalist Robert Hutchinson, who sets them in the context of their dramatic origins in a cataclysmic collision with the continent of Africa. Extended captions supply unexpected depth to the breadth and beauty of Mulligan’s images.

From the Back Cover:

STEVE MULLIGAN is one of our nation’s leading landscape photographers. He was selected "Master Landscape Photographer" of the year 2000 by Outdoor Photographer, and his work has been featured in Kodak’s Professional Photographers Showcase at the EPCOT Center. For years a contributing editor and columnist at the legendary Camera and Darkroom, Mulligan has published his landscape portfolios in Lenswork and Black and White magazines and in two auteur books, Terra Incognita (1998) and Living Landscapes (1995). In addition, he has contributed to dozens of books, ranging from art albums to science textbooks. Each year for the past decade, Mulligan has been sole photographer of BrownTrout’s Wild & Scenic Pennsylvania calendar. His one-man shows have been exhibited at museums, galleries, and universities across the country. After taking his degree in photography in Texas, Mulligan worked for years as a Colorado River guide before becoming a Canyonlands National Park river! ranger. Since becoming a full-time professional photographer, he has replaced the physical exhilaration of running rapids with the practice of extreme martial arts. Mulligan brings a Zen-conditioned mindfulness to his art and is keenly alert to and amused by random quirks in the natural landscape. He regularly donates his photographic work to non-profit organizations such as the Nature Conservancy. Mulligan lives with his wife, daughter, and a menagerie of dogs, cats, and horses.

ROBERT HUTCHINSON went on to become a research scientist at the American Museum of Natural History after conceiving a boyhood interest in earth science and archeology at the University Museum in Philadelphia. He is the author of ten books on natural history and editor of BrownTrout Publishers’ Wild & Scenic book series.

About this edition

• Publisher: Browntrout Publishers
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 156313943X
• ISBN 13: 9781563139437
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 156