THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, April 14, 1996 TAG: 9604110146
SECTION: CAROLINA COAST PAGE: 14 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: By MARY ELLEN RIDDLE
LENGTH: Medium: 78 lines
Dressed in casual gray slacks and a white cotton T-shirt, 29-year-old Maureen Kealy greeted guests at the reception for the opening of her first professional black and white photography show on Easter Sunday at Glenn Eure's Ghost Fleet Gallery in Nags Head.
Kealy lined the narrow west wing with photographic images from two trips she's taken recently. Shots depicting scenes from Baja California and visual memoirs from a South African excursion bring pieces of the ``bigger picture'' to the tiny room.
All Kealy's photographs are printed in a 5-by-7-inch format, so you'll want to move in close to examine the content. The small images force you to get personal with the details of each work that are meticulously printed, preserving nuances from a distant sand ridge, individual leaves on miniature trees and multiple shades of velvety black all on a cheek no larger than the tip of a pencil eraser.
Kealy has captured frolicking dolphins and a gray whale in photos that she took from a little skiff while out on the Magdalena Bay in Baja. With the help of a 75/300mm zoom auto focus, she identified the splotchy coloring of the whale, beads of water spraying off fins and tails and the camaraderie of dolphins, including a shot of a mother and her baby.
In the portraits of the South African people, whom Kealy described as roadside folk, one sees a casualness of dress-function outweighing style. Checked hats and polka dot dresses are scattered throughout the group along with a variety of expressions - lots of smiles and some questioning glances - reflecting a varied reaction to the photographer - some keenly aware of her presence, others oblivious.
Kealy caught children dancing at a celebration and groups of people moving down the road which is the center of activity according to Kealy. In ``Festival,'' expressions are rich including the hard stare of the center child, the laughing and unaware youth in the foreground and an older woman whose serious expression depicts more weariness than what you'd expect to find on a ``festival'' face.
Overall, Kealy's compositions are simple and elegant. From the deep velvety blacks to her characteristic stark white skies, Kealy gives us plenty of room to roam. Some shots do incorporate cloud action but she prefers the winter white to create sharp contrast. ``I like the starkness of it, the crispness of the print,'' she said. Her figures are free to move, not hemmed in by heavy sky or ponderous landscape.
``That's their daily life,'' Kealy said of the squatters who live on the fringe of the city garbage dump. ``They trudge around and get together on the road,'' she said. ``The road is a meeting place.''
Kealy deals with landscape as successfully as people. The Umkumbati River shots are layered rock ledges, waterfalls and trees sandwiched in stratas. Most pictures have a strong horizontal thrust. In ``Dunes of Magdalena Bay,'' she juxtaposes several textures - etched in the water and sand by the wind - to create a marvelous composition that's finely balanced by a bank of clouds. Kealy succeeds by taking large areas of land and identifying harmonious elements in both the fluid and concrete. As the water in her scenes flow, so do the rocks, sand, skies, marine mammals and radiance of the people. If you were to describe all this to Kealy, she would probably laugh and think it ``fancy smancy'' but it is really no mystery that, like Kealy's roadside figures, her pictures are headed ``down the road.''
Up next for the recent Colorado School of Art photography school graduate is a trip to Scotland to canvass fishing towns.
Kealy, who is vacationing on the Outer Banks from New York City, looks to return with 30 or more images for a book.
(This show will be up through May 4). MEMO: Mary Ellen Riddle covers the arts for The Carolina Coast. Send comments
and questions to her at P.O. Box 10, Nags Head, N.C. 27959. ILLUSTRATION: Photo by MARY ELLEN RIDDLE
Maureen Kealy, 29, is holding her first professional black and white
photography show at Glenn Eure's Ghost Fleet Gallery in Nags Head.
The west wing of the gallery is lined with her images from two trips
she's taken recently to Baja California and South Africa.
by CNB