Two Artists Making the Most Out of Downtime

by Skip Cohen

As I read an email from Samantha Kennedy today, I was struck by three different things.

First, is the importance of attending conferences. We met at IUSA in January when she came by the Platypod booth. As a landscape/fine art photographer and Platypod user, I knew who she was and had her on my list of artists to contact when I first started helping the company last fall. As too often happens, Samantha's information slipped through the cracks. But the lesson, which we're all missing during the pandemic, is that nothing beats meeting people directly and sharing the mutual passion for the craft.

The second thought comes from talking with photographers every day, and reading comments in the various forums on Facebook. Everyone is struggling to stay focused on the craft. Business has disappeared for so many of you, and there's no direct contact with clients and little with the outside world.

Samantha and a good friend, Jan Shannon, working together, have started a new website, "A Return to Nature." In her email to me, she wrote:

My friend and photography buddy, Jan Shannon, and I haven't been out together in over a month. But it gave us some time to go out shooting alone. We've realized people are finding some comfort in seeing photographs of nature during this time.  Maybe they can't go out at all or they are really not able to. For example, living on Long Island it's become difficult to find parks not overly crowded.  Especially now that many town parks have been closed.

Jan and I have collaborated on putting together a website of nature photography.  We each have our own page and the digital downloads there are low resolution, but free to anyone.

We also have a gallery that is set up with print fulfillment and any purchase made through there will have 10% donated to the Post Morrow Foundation.  If you would like to read more about them this is the link to their website  http://www.postmorrow.org/ .

Then there's the third and last thing that hit me...the cause-related side of their project - donating a percentage of the sales back to a non-profit they believe in. They're using their downtime to stay focused on their passion and help increase awareness for a non-profit.
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Tomorrow is Earth Day, and that makes today a perfect time to introduce you to their website.  And to Samantha and Jan - congrats! As two Platypod users, it's fun to know Platypod played a role in capturing many of your images.  And as a member of an industry that at times feels like it's been shut down - how great to see two artists collaborate over a common goal with great photographs!
 
Click any of the images below to look at individual images and follow what Samantha and Jan are up to.

Images above by Samantha Kennedy

Images above by Jan Shannon