Tag Archives: Horses

Princess Buttercup and her Magical Performing Horse

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I recently had the opportunity to visit my family’s organic citrus farm in Coachella, California.  My parents move out there for the winter and bring their english show jumping horses.  The horse in these photos is my mother’s Andalusian, Penafor or “Pete.” When Pete was young, before he joined our family, he was trained to do tricks for some sort of dinner show in Spain.  Today he will do just about anything for a carrot.  I had the help of my mother and best friend to make these images, as I could not handle Pete and the camera at the same time.  Everything you see here he does for fun and treats.

The idea behind this image was to bring to life the type of crayon drawings little girls do of princesses and their magical white horses.  I wanted to embody every little girl’s fantasy.   Buttercup is a role model princess who is strong, self-aware and poised, but also kind, gentle and loving.

Ghost Horses

Sometimes good ideas really do come like bolts of lightning.  In early June, I went to my best friend and co-collaborator, Aloyse Blair’s, bachelorette party.  We all flew out to Colorado for the Telluride Bluegrass Festival, where her sister Cecie, had rented a mansion on the ski hill serviced by private cars and a gondola.  Aloyse and I had gone to Bluegrass several times when we were in our late teens and this was such a wonderful opportunity to go back.

We spent four days dancing, drinking, and having an incredible time with thirteen of the most wonderful girls on the planet.  One day, while getting beers at the festival, it suddenly, with no warning, dawned on me that I should take photos with our horses.  Although it might seem obvious, given that my family lives on a horse ranch, it had actually never even crossed my mind.  Long exposure horses: “ghost horses.”  When I got home from the festival, I told my mom who just laughed and said that she had been wondering when I would figure it out.

A few weeks later, after getting back from Montana, while I was taking my workshop at Anderson Ranch, I decided to start experimenting.  I took my mom on a moonless night, and headed out into the field to meet my two elected models, George and Stoli.  I had to have help with this shoot because the horses were really excited to have company and would have clearly knocked the tripod over.  We used a few small lights to illuminate the horses from the front while I did my best not to get trampled.

As per my workshop, I tried to stay close to the camera and tell a story, to bring on the theater.  One of the other exercises from the workshop was to choose the title for the image before it was made.  The title of the first image below (and my favorite) is, “This Time She Came Prepared,” or as Arno nicknamed it, “George the Fire Eating Horse.”  I am really happy with this work and I can’t wait to keep experimenting with horses in the future.

The Bridgers

Concluding The Sacred Door Trail opening ceremony, a group of us headed to Weston Pew’s stunning family-ranch that nestles up against the Bridger mountain range just north of Bozeman, Montana.  The week spent there was a much-needed decompression after the spiritual intensity of the previous few days.  We spent our time resting, singing along with guitars on the porch, eating home cooked food and going on a bunch of outings.  One of these outings was on the fourth of July and included rafting down the Yellowstone River, eating a picnic lunch, and singing and dancing the night away at the Bank Bar (a local cowboy watering hole), in Wilsall, Montana.

During this time there was a full moon and though I was pretty spent from camping, I found time to take a few photos.  My previously mentioned partner in crime, Melanie Malia, helped me wander out into the moonlight to take some photos with the Pew’s lovely grey horse.  Just as we were starting to get our rhythm, “Bill” the notorious beast of a dog, came and did a fine job of chasing the horses away.  As everyone who was there can attest, the name “Bill” on the ranch is generally said at full volume and followed by some sort of accusation or negative…. “BILL… NOOOO BILL… NO BILL… BAD DOG BILL… STOP THAT BILL… BIIIIILLLLLL!!!!!!!!”

Once Bill was content with the horse situation, he lay down in the road and happily watched us finish the shoot.  As I have mentioned before, I have a very hard time working in full-moon light.  The conditions are very similar to working in daylight and present a huge challenge when working alone.  It’s a bit like being on a fully lit stage with no script, set, or props, and told to just do something cool. Inevitably, whatever you do ends up feelinging a bit contrived and awkward.  Personally, I feel this way about these images, but I have also had some good response to the work, so I feel like I am close to something new.  In the next post I will go into some of what I learned in my workshop with Arno Minkenen… as I try for a breakthrough.