Lori Jantz, one of the newest members of the Osoyoos Photography Club, shows her photo of horses at golden hour. (Richard McGuire photo)
The Osoyoos Photography Club has added some new members with very different photographic styles since the last time the club exhibited at The Art Gallery Osoyoos in the autumn of 2014.
Three years and several months later, the local photographers are opening a fresh show, Frame by Frame, at the gallery this week.
“I think this one will be different because we have a few more members and some newer members participating this year,” said Greg Reely, club president.
Besides the different photographic styles, there will be more variety in the materials on which the photos are printed, said Reely.
“It’s not just straight photo prints in frames,” he said. “You’ll see a little more canvas, metal and acrylic prints as well, and different sizes like panoramas.”
Back in 2014, the club consisted of only 14 members, who met in a little room up a steep flight of wooden stairs above the gallery.
But soon, as new members joined, the club outgrew its space and had to find other locations – the Sonora Centre, the Osoyoos Golf Club and now the Elks Hall.
And, for the last few years, the membership has been close to two dozen, with members coming from as far north as Gallagher Lake and as far south as Oroville.
But even before the expansion, club members showed very different styles and subject matter.
Take for example Merv Graf and Lisa Young, two photographers who exhibited in 2014 and will be back in this show.
Graf often photographs scenes of the night skies, researching where celestial bodies will be at what times, when the skies will be clear, and when solar conditions are likely to produce displays of the Northern Lights or Aurora Borialis.
His photos are meticulously planned.
Young, by contrast, had little technical background when she joined the club, but she has a sharp eye for spotting happenstance scenes that made beautiful photographs.
When interviewed prior to the 2014 exhibition, Young explained the difference.
“In my opinion, there are two types of photographers,” she said. “One that sets up and one that captures. I capture.”
One of the newer members is Werner Maurer who moved from the Lower Mainland to Gallagher Lake.
Though he considers his style more eclectic than distinct, and says he doesn’t think of himself as an artist, other club members might disagree.
“I love his photography because his eye is a lot more abstract,” said Reely. “He looks at things from a completely different angle.”
Maurer might take a subject others would see as boring and find a unique way of looking at it, he said.
“It’s definitely more artistic and he’s got a really cool eye,” said Reely.
“I never go anywhere without a camera and I shoot anything that grabs my attention,” said Maurer. “There are certain things I tend to gravitate towards. Geometrics is one of them. I try to look for shooting angles that not everybody gets or thinks of and sometimes I punch up the colour a lot.”
One of the newest members, Lori Jantz, only joined at the end of the summer, several months after moving to Osoyoos from Kamloops.
Although she takes stunning portraits and did portraiture as a part-time business in Kamloops, she’s picked several landscapes as more appropriate for this show.
Horses at golden hour, a lotus flower in a lily pond, a silky waterfall and a deteriorating old homestead are among the subjects she may exhibit.
Like Maurer and Graf, she learned photography in the film days, but switched to digital. At one point she realized her digital photos weren’t achieving the quality she used to get with film.
Unlike some members, who have gone back to film at least part of the time, Jantz invested in a better digital camera and spent the time and effort to improve as a photographer.
Reely, the club president, is one of the photographers who edits his work extensively in post-production. Others don’t.
“I discovered the power of editing maybe 10 years ago,” he said. “Now I don’t mind sitting in front of the computer for two, three or four hours just editing photos. Sometimes you have a vision and sometimes you really have to edit.”
Reely expects about 17 members to exhibit with roughly 70 photographs in total.
Club members, he said, range from beginners to casual hobbyists to professionals.
Members join for social reasons, but also to learn from others whose styles may be different from their own, he said.
For information about the Osoyoos Photography Club, email Greg Reely at [email protected].
The exhibition officially kicks off with a reception open to the public from 6 to 8 p.m. this Friday, Feb. 9.
The show runs until March 3 at The Art Gallery Osoyoos at 8713 Main Street just west of town hall. Hours are noon to 4 p.m., Tuesday to Saturday.
RICHARD McGUIRE
Osoyoos Times
