Photographer's
statement
It
was in
the summer of 2005 and for almost twenty years I had dedicated much of
my free time to finding exceptional natural beauty within Alabama. For
the last three years
of it I had been exploring our navigable rivers and lakes. My final
project was to explore the Mobile/Tensaw Delta.
After
covering the upper Delta, I moved southward to explore
The Basin Negro. Here for the first time I found masses
of the American lotus, something I had long anticipated. They
were even more beautiful than I had imagined.
 What I
couldn't have imagined was Smith's Bayou. Shortly after entering this
waterway I came upon an S-shaped curve lined with lotuses left and
right. Beauty radiated from all directions and it struck me as
the most beautiful place I had seen in Alabama.
I
have noticed that people are mostly unaware of beauty unless it jumps
out at them.
I have crossed paths with many Alabamians who enjoy the outdoors, but
whenever
I find beauty in an ordinary subject, they walk by without a second
glance.
No one misses a waterfall, but if a beautiful view is nestled in the
trees along the roadside, hardly anyone will notice.
On this particular
day,
I
found the only fishing boats in the entire basin were crowded along a
short
stretch of the beautiful S-shaped curve of Smith's Bayou. I attempted
to
maneuver past them without scaring away the fish. One fishermen asked
me
what I was doing and I replied that I was working on a book of
Alabama's natural beauty. He didn't strike me as someone who would
particularly appreciate such an endeavor, but his reply was that "If
you're looking for beauty, you sure are in the right place". I realized that the
beauty of Smith's Bayou was too great for anyone
to miss.
Smith's
Bayou was one of the last places I explored for The Natural Beauty Of Alabama. It also serves as a metaphor
for what I have worked to accomplish. I would like to think that after
seeing my 126-image representation of Alabama,
no one can possibly miss the beauty of our state.
Frank
Emory
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