Features
Featured New Artist: Ethan Welty
After receiving a camera as a gift Ethan quickly discovered that he could use photography to express his fascination with the natural world and the diversity of cultures that inhabit that varied landscape. “I am a wide-eyed wanderer. Subject matter came easily and the camera followed.” He began to exhibit his nature photography around Seattle and it wasn’t until his senior year working as photographer and photo editor for the college newspaper that he was exposed to photojournalism. “I’ve been challenging myself to incorporate a more documentary style into my travel photography ever since, to better reflect the intimacy I seek and often find on my journeys”
Ethan graduated last year from the University of Washington with B.S. degrees in Physics and Mathematical Biology. He has been working for USGS, studying the spatial distribution of fish and habitat along the wilderness watersheds of Idaho and Washington state. He is considering graduate study in Environmental Earth Sciences starting next Fall and he hopes his career in photography and ecology research will enrich each other. His recent work from Mexico is a good example of this shift. “I grew up nurturing a very quantitative, scientific mind. Photography is ever more influential in how I perceive the world as it develops my qualitative, creative side, and I feel an increasing urge to dig deeper with my new found tools, to explore a subject visually with the same assiduity I apply to studying a landscape scientifically. The photograph is powerful witness, but the journey, not the photography, is what matters most to me.”
Fascinated by the chemistry between earth and ocean as they meet along the Olympic Coast he will be backpacking traverse of the entire west coast of the Olympic Peninsula in the near future to explore the dynamics of motion, erosion, life and light. In the meantime, he will renew his visits to the local city zoo - the small series ‘Zoo Gorillas’ on his site is the beginning of a budding personal project exploring the relationship between man, nature and other animals.
Ethan is based in Seattle and recently signed with Aurora.
Ethan Welty is this week’s Featured New Artist from our friends at Aurora Photos. Aurora’s staff regularly seeks out new, up and coming photographers to highlight on abouttheimage.com. We hope our readers will enjoy learning about these young pro-photographers and seeing examples of their outstanding work. Photographers who would like to be considered for publication as a Featured New Artist can submit their resume and portfolio by email to fna [at] abouttheimage.com.
Posted in: Featured New Artists, Features, Interviews, Photographers
