Photography was my dad's hobby and I learned from him and began making and collecting photos in the 1950's. I still have his camera and my first 'cereal box' camera along with film and moving pictures of my area. Our early Black and White Television broadcasts and movies in the '50's taught me how to see and appreciate 'Shadow and Light' and I fell in love with black and white photography. After a childhood accident I was maimed and had to have a job/career that didn't involve sitting very long and after college studies in business, art, photo-journalism, humanities, healing and communications developed a desire and skill set designing and creating visual history stories, visual exhibits. I flunked out of history because it had no pictures so teaching history in a visual and beautiful way became my niche. As a lifelong professional photographer myself - I can say the collection contains all phases of the historical, modern, and contemporary era of photography from the earliest processes to the present digital and Ai. The collection documents pivotal moments, everyday life, and evolving artistic styles across generations in the Pacific Northwest. It includes original negatives and materials from over 78 photographers. Significant professional photographers such as the Joe and Vibert Jeffers of the Jeffers Art Studio Collection as well as works by amateur photographer, Mary Rowland Mires whose art is undiscovered genius.
THE LONG STORY....
Viewing historic film negatives in large format within the Jeffers Studio archive - after many years of working with 35mm film in my professional communications career, news coverage and personal work - I fell in awe and in love. It changed my career and life. The wonder of historic films showed me the history of my hometown and was eye-opening to a woman who was a news and current events photographer. But it was the talent of Vibert's brilliant artist's eye that stunned me. As no one of my generation knew of this local talent and photographers of the past here in the 'remote' PNW they weren't considered as artists - rather just working photographers.
The photographs also showed me what I could gain as an artist from this treasure trove. Later, after researching local and regional photo collections available, I realized the danger of what was in danger of being lost. So I created a business with the Mission to Preserve & Celebrate the Photographers and Photohistory of the Salish Sea and Pacific Northwest Regions of North America. And to Celebrate my Home Region that means so much to me.
SMYTH LANDING PHOTO-HISTORY WALLS
As I receive no grant funding and operate as a private stock photography business funding my preservation and restoration of historical photographs solely by the Sales and Licensing of these photographs - I thank you for your interest and also your Sales! Learning very early the importance of By creating “Museums Without Walls,” for the past 40+ years I have brought historical photographs into everyday spaces, inviting all who view and particularly community members to connect with their shared past.
This is my way of recognizing the importance of remembering and honoring the past and our ancestors but the creators of these photos, especially during times when connection and understanding are most needed.
Susan using Jeffers Field Camera, Gull Harbor, 1984. Photo by Carl Cook.
I came to photography as it was my dad's hobby and I escaped its watchful eye by getting behind the lens. My first photo was grade school friends and go-cart racing using dad's camera then capturing my own images in 1957 after acquiring my first camera, a plastic box with one setting, by sending in breakfast cereal box tops
After college Business, Humanities and Communications degrees I became a professional public information officer concentrating on photography creating visual stories on film and in traveling displays for companies and for state government. In 1982, while on a Humanities Grant on Women Political Pioneers in our Washington State Government I discovered the chaos of photo studio archives private and public and assisted in founding local and state government photo archives and getting legislative interest backing. After which I formally established The Susan Parish Collection of Photography and purchased The Jeffers Art Studio Collection. And, founded Shadow Catchers in 1989 as the distributor and production arm for my photographic-based products, utilizing images licensed from my collections. Link to View my own Art Here
Born and raised in the Southern Puget Sound region by an adventurous motor-head father on a ranch in when we weren't working on the ranch or racing motorized vehicles, we were exploring the Salish Seas and the Olympic Mountains. My soul is tied to deep forests and wild shorelines. Cognizant and sensitive to its history and too rapid changes affecting this region.
My work celebrates the vital role photography plays in our image-based culture as a communication tool, an expressive medium, as primary documentary records, and of course, as an artistic expression of the photographers. As a photographer myself for almost 50 years now, I understand this medium of visual communication and have learned a great deal from my fellow photographers ~ long dead ~ but their lessons are in 'seeing'.
These photographers remain unsung in the world of art & history yet in my view, their photographs are deemed more important than those more acclaimed. As those in the wilderness risked life and limb to take the photographs and share them with us. These windows into the past are showing us a more inclusive history than we may have been taught.
Parish is a multi-generational native of the Puget Sound and Salish Sea Region always living along the shores of the inland sea in the shadow of great mountain ranges. She began making and collecting photographs as a child in the 1950s and has been a working professional in the fields of communications and the Humanities specializing in Still photography of the Pacific Northwest and Salish Sea region of North America since 1975.
While researching & producing a traveling display on "The Political Pioneers ~ Early Women of the Washington Legislature" in 1980, she discovered her love for historical photography and purchased the Jeffers Art Studio Collection in Olympia, Washington. Discovering that the contents of some of the earliest photography studios were regularly and without foresight regularly destroyed along with numerous traditional ways of life in her region with the rapidly changing attitudes about the environment. It soon became her mission to collect, preserve, educate, and honor the photographers, and their art. She believes in 'Museums without walls' using commercial and public spaces to teach history - visually.
JOURNALS OF A SHADOW CATCHER - Is Currently Off Line