News
Photographer Wendy Shattil's Life In The Wild
By John Burton
MIDDLETOWN - In nearly three decades as a professional photographer, Wendy Shattil has been very close to nature.
For 29 years she has been traveling through much of the western United States, exploring wildlife and documenting it through her photos.
"In our photography," she said on Saturday, "we're always telling stories."
Among the species whose lives she has documented are the swift fox, falcons and other animals that she has followed around her home in the relatively urban area of Denver, Colorado as well as bear in Alaska, along with ocelots and a relatively rare species of bird that call the southern Texas Rio Grande Valley home.
"That's the great thing about watching wildlife," she said. "There's a story in every image."
Shattil appeared Saturday at Middletown Public Library, 55 New Monmouth Road, where she shared some of her work and told stories about the images.
In her nearly 30 years as a professional nature photographer, Shattil has partnered with fellow professional Bob Rozinski for much of that time. Together they have produced approximately 350,000 images, many of which have been published in periodicals and books. The two have also won a number of prestigious awards for their photography.
Shattil and Rozinski will often go on a shoot together, she explained. But, "We don't want to stand side-by-side." Instead, they use their abilities honed over the years to capture images from different perspectives.
"We both come in with a lot of experience," she explained. "So we know what we're doing."
"Our backyard is North America," she said. But she and Rozinski have traveled to Central America, capturing the area's large cats, as well as birds and snakes.
Out west, the two have collected images of the American bison, and have taken a series of shots exploring Wyoming's Red Desert, photographing wild horses and the area's expansive dunes.
To take good nature photographs, she explained, "means being out there enough," being aware of your environment, wishing for a little luck and hoping for the best.
"You learn enough of the wildlife subjects," she said, "so you know what might happen."
She and Rozinski have been in southern Texas, capturing not only the region's fauna, but documenting the impact that the ongoing border fence project is having on the area's wildlife.
The fence is expected to stretch from San Diego, California, to the Gulf of Mexico, separating the U.S. from Mexico. Their work is on behalf of the International League of Conservation Photographers; and the politics of the project aside, Shattil said, "I think it's useful to know what the effects are."
As a conservationist, Shattil said, the effects have been serious. With already 95 percent of the natural habitat already lost, the construction is having a dramatic impact on that remaining five percent. Case in point, she said, the ocelot, which would travel back and forth in the region, is now dwindled down to about 100. In Wyoming, natural gas drilling is having an impact on that area's wildlife.
Even though, they have continued to be immersed in nature for these many years, Shattil said she and Rozinski had never been at risk from the animals, even when they found themselves amidst 19 bears in Alaska. "You always want to be aware of them," she said, with the key being, "you don't want to get complacent."
To view Shattil and Rozinski's photos, log on to the photographers' Web site, www.dancingpelican.com
