USU’s MUSEUM DISPLAYS
PHOTOGRAPHS BY MARY PECK: “AWAY OUT OVER EVERYTHING: THE OLYMPIC PENINSULA
AND THE ELWHA RIVER”
LOGAN — The Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art, located on the campus
of Utah State University, Logan, announces the exhibition of photographs by
Mary Peck. The exhibition, organized by the Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art,
is selected from Peck’s most recent body of work inspired by the landscape
and wilderness of the Pacific Northwest. It features 30 wide format photographs
that capture the mystery of the land and touches on ever poignant issues of
land management and conservation of nature, said Victoria Rowe, museum director.
“Away Out Over Everything: The Olympic Peninsula and the Elwha River”
will be on exhibit from April 5-June 30, 2006.
Peck’s photographs are inspired by long walks and extended backcountry
trips on Washington’s Olympic Peninsula.
“Through her large format photography, Peck describes the majesty of the
ancient forest and flowing streams and captures the changing attitudes toward
the use and preservation of land and water in the West through her contrasting
imagery of clear cut and massive dams,” said Rowe.
“There are different ways of being in the woods,” Peck said of her
work. ”Staying there over a period of days or weeks allows me to find
an inner quiet and a chance to interact with all I see. At some point something
changes. I become a participant, a part of the fluidity and change that is all
around me. I’m no longer separate.”
“For more than a decade, photographer Mary Peck has immersed herself in
this landscape,” said poet Tim McNulty. “She is drawn to the large
river valleys, the Elwha, Hoh, and Queets as well as the wilderness coast, places
where the grand cycles of weather, hydrologic exchange and geologic process
are most vivid. Her approach is less to document the land than to experience
herself as part of its living systems.”
The exhibition is accompanied by the recently published book, “Away Out
Over Everything: The Olympic Peninsula and the Elwha River.” The book,
published by Stanford University Press (2004), includes an essay by Charles
Wilkinson.
A graduate of Utah State University in 1975, Peck has photographed landscapes
in various parts of the world for more than 30 years. Her work has been exhibited,
and her photographs are held in many collections throughout the world, including
the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art,
the Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, the Denver Art Museum and the Amon Carter
Museum. She is the principal author of “Chaco Canyon: A Center and Its
World,” and is completing work on a book of photographs from Bhutan. She
lives on the Olympic Peninsula.
For more information or to schedule a tour of the museum, call (435) 797-0165.
The Nora Eccles Harrison Museum of Art is located on the USU campus at 650 North
1100 East, Logan, Utah, 84322, (435) 797-0163; fax (435) 7978-3423. Information
is available at the museum’s Web site, http://www.artmuseum.usu.edu. The
museum is open Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, 10 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.; Wednesday,
10 a.m. to 7 p.m.; Saturday, noon-4 p.m. The museum is closed Sundays, Mondays
and holidays. Admission is free. The museum is accessible to persons with disabilities.
Parking for the museum is available in lot “C3” to the west of the
museum. The parking fee in this area is $6 ($3 will be refunded if parked for
two hours or less). Parking is free after 3:45 p.m. and on weekends. Parking
is also available in the USU Parking Terrace, located near the Taggart Student
Center for $1.50/hour ($7.50/day maximum). Free parking after 2 p.m. is available
at lot “B,” located at the corner of 700 North and 1200 East (by
Aggie Ice Cream).
March 31, 2006
Contact and writer: Deb Banerjee (435) 797-8207