It's a beautiful view, somewhere out west: A mountain range soars toward the sky, while heavy weather pushes through a valley, trailing sheets of rain. In the foreground, an old split-rail fence zigzags through tall grass and wildflowers.
Montserrat College of Art Gallery Curator Leonie Bradbury held her hand across the bottom of this photograph, which was taken by Laura McPhee. The picture will appear with work by five other photographers in the exhibit "America Now," debuting at Montserrat Gallery tonight.
"If it was all about the scenic view, she should have shot it like that," Bradbury said, still hiding part of the image.
"But it's not," she said, and removed her hand to reveal a blue plastic tarp lying on the ground at the base of the fence.
At first, it's distracting. But gradually, unexpected harmonies emerge between the tarp and the rest of the scene.
"It almost — in terms of shape, formally — it echoes the mountains," Bradbury said. "Even the color — I'm sure (that's) why she shot it." Indeed, the tarp's blue could have been distilled from the mountains, clouds and shadows beyond.
"It's evidence of the way that humans use the land," Bradbury said, and depicting that evidence is "something that all of the photographers have in common."
Daniel Cheek, for instance, shows a line of trucks at a truck stop in the desert. Their colorful cabs — red, white and blue — are touched by a few rays of twilight.
But the hardtop they are parked on is what ultimately absorbs the eye. A murky, purplish brown, pitted from age and hard use, the surface is a study in texture and seems continuous with the bluff that towers in the distance, behind the trucks.
In this photo, and others in the show, human use of the land is depicted with ambivalence, as an exception in nature, an abuse of the environment, but also as the means by which nature is framed, so its beauty can be appreciated.
"Our expectation, in terms of photography, is so low right now, the standard is so low," said Bradbury, referring to "pixilated images, even on the evening news, that were shot with a cell phone camera or video."
These pictures are produced by a culture that wants its images "instant and fast. It's all about the moment and capturing it," Bradbury said.
The work in "America Now," which Bradbury assembled with Assistant Curator Shana Dumont, is by contrast "the antithesis of your cell phone photo."
With the exception of Zoe Strauss, all of the photographers in this exhibit use large-format cameras, with bellows lenses and a dark cloth to drape over their heads.
The slow process of large format technology results in "image quality so rich that you can print it at 10-by-8-feet." One photograph by McPhee, of a birch grove where large game is being skinned and butchered, is reproduced "almost to scale" in the show, Bradbury said, so the viewer feels they could step into the scene.
The many choices photographers make, working in this careful, deliberate fashion, result in pictures that are "not straight documentary, because it's all so subjective. It's really poetic."
She compares the work to portraiture and in this, "America Now" also opposes another photographic trend, one associated with the art world rather than mass markets.
"If you look in the photo magazines or galleries, there's a trend of imagery out there documenting a lack of culture, that generic culture that's all over the U.S. It really focuses on the homogeneity and globalism of culture, the Starbucks, the parking lot at Walmart, the big-box stores," Bradbury said.
"America Now," by contrast, emphasizes regional particulars, specific places with recognizable identities: New England, Alaska, South Philadelphia, the West.
By displaying a range of pictures from each photographer the show narrates the passage of time, and it is in narrative, the stories pictures tell, that local accents emerge.
"If you've been to Alaska, you're like, 'Yes, that's what it looks like,'" Bradbury said. "Those are the kinds of people you run into, and that is the view."
If you go
What: "America Now," exhibit of photography by Daniel Cheek, Ben Huff, Shane Lavalette, Laura McPhee, Alec Soth and Zoe Strauss.
When: Feb. 5 to April 10; reception tonight from 6 to 8; "Contemporary Cocktail," conversation with Zoe Strauss, Daniel Cheek and Ron DiRito, tomorrow from 7 to 9 p.m.
Where: Montserrat College of Art Gallery, 23 Essex St., Beverly.
More information: All exhibits and events free. Events hot line 978-921-4242, option 3.
