SQUINT: LIKE AN SLR CAMERA LENS WITH ITS F-RATIO STOPPED DOWN TO ACHIEVE DEPTH-OF-FIELD IN GREATER DETAIL NEAR-AND-FAR. ACHIEVING ACROSS SPECTRUM OF HUMAN ENDEAVOR AWARENESS PERHAPS EVEN ENLIGHTENMENT.
RIDING CEASELESS CURRENTS OF CRISIS AND CHAOS, OUR SHIFTING WORLD WILL NEVER
BE THE SAME: THAT’S THE BAD NEWS. THE GOOD NEWS: THERE’S A REVISIONING OF DIVERSE FORMS OF CREATIVITY AND INGENUITY EMERGING FULL THROTTLE, INCLUDING: ARTS, ENERGY, TECHNOLOGY, ARTISANAL, ECONOMICS, COSMOLOGY, RACE, INFORMATION, RELATIONSHIP, IDENTITY, FUSION, GASTRONOMY, GOVERNMENT, DEMOCRACY, COMPLEXITY,
INTERSECTIONALITY, MEDICINE, NEUROSCIENCE, SPIRITUALITY
– AND CLIMATE, CLIMATE, CLIMATE.
AMIDST THE MISHEGOSS OF THE LAST TWO YEARS, MILLIONS OF PEOPLE WORLDWIDE
ENDURED ONGOING WAVES OF PANDEMIC AND SUFFERING. THE STAY-IN-PLACE
EDICT CERTAINLY STOPPED ME IN MY TRACKS. DURING THE LOCKDOWN,
INDUSTRIOUS PEOPLE SHAPE SHIFTED INTO DIVERSE AND UNEXPECTED REALMS.
QUELLING FRUSTRATION AND ANGER, CREATIVITY, INNOVATION AND PRODUCTIVITY
EMERGED GIVING RISE TO LIFE TRANSITIONS AND NEW ENDEAVORS.
LATENT PROJECTS RESURFACED FOR MANY AS CREATIVE EXPRESSIONS EVOLVED.
CITY RESTAURANT SERVERS MOVED TO THE COUNTRY AND BECAME WOOD WORKERS
IN DEMAND. PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS LISTED, TAKING ON WATER, LIKE CAPSIZING
SHIPS LOADED WITH SLOSHING CARGO. FRIENDSHIPS REKINDLED WITH GREATER
TRANSPARENCY, MUTUALITY AND BALAST. NEW GENERATIVE ALLIANCES AROSE.
WITHIN ALL THIS TRANSITION, I GESTATED PUBLISHING PROJECTS (VISIT BOOKS PAGE) AND A NEW WEBSITE. WITH 20,000 IMAGES IN MY ADOBE LIGHTROOM ALONE, AND MANY THOUSAND OLD CHROMES STUFFED INTO PROVERBIAL SHOEBOXES, PHOTO MONTAGES FROM MY WORLDWIDE TRAVELS AND ADVENTURES TOOK SHAPE ANEW. MY LOVE OF WRITING AND PHOTOGRAPHY (VISIT MY STORYSHARDS AND BLOG PAGES) RECONNECT MY IMAGES WITH THEIR ORIGINAL SITUATIONAL NARRATIVES – RECOVERING EXPERIENCES DERIVED FROM THE PENTIMENTO OF MEMORY. RECENT YEARS HAVE ENGENDERED A CONFLUENCE OF SOUL WITH THE TIME-LAPSE OF MY CAREER. A LONG GLOBAL EXPOSURE EVOLVED INTO NEW PERSPECTIVES AND CREATIVE PATHS FORWARD. MAY MY JOURNEY INSPIRE YOUR OWN – AND AWAKEN INTENTIONALITY FOR YOUR RELEVANT AND ENGAGED CREATIVITY IN OUR SHAMBOLIC ERA.
WONDER WHATEVER PENDING “ISMS” MIGHT BE ON THE VERGE OF TRENDING?
I PRAY NEITHER NEGATIVE/POSITIVE DUALITIES TRANSPIRE,
NOR SHADOW BOXERS ARISE ON THE HORIZON.
HOPEFULNESS AND IMAGINATION ARE ON A CONTINUOUS UPTICK.
OLD THOUGHT AND EXPIRING BELIEF SYSTEMS ARE FLAMING OUT
– SOME NOT FAST ENOUGH. SQUINT: DEPTH-OF-FIELD ENABLES ME TO KEEP THE LONG
VIEW SHARP. IT LEAVES ME ABIDING AT CORE WITH MY FUNDAMENTAL MANTRA,
“CREATIVITY IS THE BEST REVENGE.”
THE BIOGRAPHICAL PARTICULARS OF MY FAR-FLUNG FREELANCE CAREER AS A DESTINATION
AND DECORATIVE ARTS PHOTOGRAPHER, INCLUDING: MAGAZINE COLUMNIST AND BOOK AUTHOR; INTERNATIONAL TOUR GUIDE; WORKSHOP FACILITATOR AND SEMINAR HOST;
AND PHOTO INDUSTRY INFLUENCER SPONSORED BY CANON, INC. FORTHCOMING PUBLISHING PROJECTS ARE DETAILED IN THE FOLLOWING BIO.
SQUINT: LIKE AN SLR CAMERA LENS WITH ITS F-RATIO STOPPED DOWN TO ACHIEVE DEPTH-OF-FIELD IN GREATER DETAIL NEAR-AND-FAR. ACHIEVING ACROSS SPECTRUM OF HUMAN ENDEAVOR AWARENESS PERHAPS EVEN ENLIGHTENMENT.
RIDING CEASELESS CURRENTS OF CRISIS AND CHAOS, OUR SHIFTING WORLD WILL NEVER
BE THE SAME: THAT’S THE BAD NEWS. THE GOOD NEWS: THERE’S A REVISIONING OF DIVERSE FORMS OF CREATIVITY AND INGENUITY EMERGING FULL THROTTLE, INCLUDING: ARTS, ENERGY, TECHNOLOGY, ARTISANAL, ECONOMICS, COSMOLOGY, RACE, INFORMATION, RELATIONSHIP, IDENTITY, FUSION, GASTRONOMY, GOVERNMENT, DEMOCRACY, COMPLEXITY,
INTERSECTIONALITY, MEDICINE, NEUROSCIENCE, SPIRITUALITY
– AND CLIMATE, CLIMATE, CLIMATE.
AMIDST THE MISHEGOSS OF THE LAST TWO YEARS, MILLIONS OF PEOPLE WORLDWIDE
ENDURED ONGOING WAVES OF PANDEMIC AND SUFFERING. THE STAY-IN-PLACE
EDICT CERTAINLY STOPPED ME IN MY TRACKS. DURING THE LOCKDOWN,
INDUSTRIOUS PEOPLE SHAPE SHIFTED INTO DIVERSE AND UNEXPECTED REALMS.
QUELLING FRUSTRATION AND ANGER, CREATIVITY, INNOVATION AND PRODUCTIVITY
EMERGED GIVING RISE TO LIFE TRANSITIONS AND NEW ENDEAVORS.
LATENT PROJECTS RESURFACED FOR MANY AS CREATIVE EXPRESSIONS EVOLVED.
CITY RESTAURANT SERVERS MOVED TO THE COUNTRY AND BECAME WOOD WORKERS
IN DEMAND. PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS LISTED, TAKING ON WATER, LIKE CAPSIZING
SHIPS LOADED WITH SLOSHING CARGO. FRIENDSHIPS REKINDLED WITH GREATER
TRANSPARENCY, MUTUALITY AND BALAST. NEW GENERATIVE ALLIANCES AROSE.
WITHIN ALL THIS TRANSITION, I GESTATED PUBLISHING PROJECTS (VISIT BOOKS PAGE) AND A NEW WEBSITE. WITH 20,000 IMAGES IN MY ADOBE LIGHTROOM ALONE, AND MANY THOUSAND OLD CHROMES STUFFED INTO PROVERBIAL SHOEBOXES, PHOTO MONTAGES FROM MY WORLDWIDE TRAVELS AND ADVENTURES TOOK SHAPE ANEW. MY LOVE OF WRITING AND PHOTOGRAPHY (VISIT MY STORYSHARDS AND BLOG PAGES) RECONNECT MY IMAGES WITH THEIR ORIGINAL SITUATIONAL NARRATIVES – RECOVERING EXPERIENCES DERIVED FROM THE PENTIMENTO OF MEMORY. RECENT YEARS HAVE ENGENDERED A CONFLUENCE OF SOUL WITH THE TIME-LAPSE OF MY CAREER. A LONG GLOBAL EXPOSURE EVOLVED INTO NEW PERSPECTIVES AND CREATIVE PATHS FORWARD. MAY MY JOURNEY INSPIRE YOUR OWN – AND AWAKEN INTENTIONALITY FOR YOUR RELEVANT AND ENGAGED CREATIVITY IN OUR SHAMBOLIC ERA.
WONDER WHATEVER PENDING “ISMS” MIGHT BE ON THE VERGE OF TRENDING?
I PRAY NEITHER NEGATIVE/POSITIVE DUALITIES TRANSPIRE,
NOR SHADOW BOXERS ARISE ON THE HORIZON.
HOPEFULNESS AND IMAGINATION ARE ON A CONTINUOUS UPTICK.
OLD THOUGHT AND EXPIRING BELIEF SYSTEMS ARE FLAMING OUT
– SOME NOT FAST ENOUGH. SQUINT: DEPTH-OF-FIELD ENABLES ME TO KEEP THE LONG
VIEW SHARP. IT LEAVES ME ABIDING AT CORE WITH MY FUNDAMENTAL MANTRA,
“CREATIVITY IS THE BEST REVENGE.”
THE BIOGRAPHICAL PARTICULARS OF MY FAR-FLUNG FREELANCE CAREER AS A DESTINATION
AND DECORATIVE ARTS PHOTOGRAPHER, INCLUDING: MAGAZINE COLUMNIST AND BOOK AUTHOR; INTERNATIONAL TOUR GUIDE; WORKSHOP FACILITATOR AND SEMINAR HOST;
AND PHOTO INDUSTRY INFLUENCER SPONSORED BY CANON, INC. FORTHCOMING PUBLISHING PROJECTS ARE DETAILED IN THE FOLLOWING BIO.
Known for her graphic color intensive style, Lisl Dennis has experienced the world on editorial and commercial assignments in the travel and adventure, design and decorative arts, and in the hospitality and lifestyle industries. As a multimedia visual artist, Lisl’s optically intimate style in her retreat programs Creativity in Culture and StoryShards are trend setting. Her vibrant visual storytelling emphasizes the Moral Imagination as a central imperative in our fragmented world. As a freelancer based in New York City and Santa Fe, Lisl was an influencer known for expanding the definition of
travel photography. Her award-winning signature abstract visual sensibility characterizes her style to this day.
From 1968-1970, Lisl was the First woman staff photographer on the Boston Globe. Not a one-trick-photo-pony, her developmental journalism experience during tumultuous times set Lisl up for a worldwide career that embraced diverse disciplines on location in: photojournalism, narrative portraiture, travel and hospitality, architecture and interiors, still-life and the decorative arts more broadly.
In the early 70s, Lisl and her writer husband Landt Dennis, founded and hosted the Travel Photography Workshop in Santa Fe, which ran for twenty years. Sponsored by CANON and KODAK, Lisl hosted workshops, seminars, and creativity retreats nationwide. She taught at the New School in New York City.
Growing up in rural New Jersey, Lisl’s two older brothers included her in splitting wood in their forest acreage, ice hockey, Little League, and building tree houses. Lisl also drew on her childhood exposure and collaborations as the daughter of an interior designer mother and architect father. Her editorial credits include: Architectural Digest, House Beautiful, Country Living, World of Interiors, and Town & Country.
After being a columnist for Popular Photography magazine, Lisl became the Traveler’s Eye columnist for Outdoor Photographer. She reported on her rich worldwide cultural experiences at the intersection of creativity, culture, and destination photography. After 911, OP resisted Lisl’s reporting and points-of-view on global socio-political realities. Her stories did not promote idealized landscape-porn and wildlife imagery. At least editors and advertisers didn’t think so.
Lisl went on to a decades long worldwide editorial and commercial photography career.
SQUINT
See Beauty
Between the Lines
TO SQUINT HAS ITS PRACTICAL USES, especially in the searing head lights of today’s wars, famines and floods, scorching fires, wily pandemics and performative shenanigans in global political egos.
In photographic parlance, squinting is akin to an SLR camera lens with its F-ratio stopped down to achieve maximum depth-of-field. With greater definition near-and-far, one gains optimal intimacy in world view. Perhaps even enlightenment: viewing things as they really are. Seeing clearly between the storylines, one may glimpse a scene which is truly beautiful. Could be the striated crepuscule out a plane window – despite the trepidations of today’s travel.
Squinting at patches of my past, I am grateful for the world-wind of my professional and personal travels. By the time I was thirty, I’d been to over thirty countries. In these destinations, I’d witnessed horror, sorrow and abundant beauty.
(Insert)
Wherever you find beauty, it’s your personal refuge. Tuck images away forever in the pentimento of memory. But keep seeking between the lines until you’re really ready to open the aperture of your eyes for shallow depth-of-field. Move in closer for wide-angle shallow depth-of-field. For optical intimacy such that you can touch the world in view: The boundary lines disappear.
As renown war photojournalist Robert Capa affirmed: “If your pictures aren’t strong enough, you’re not close enough.”
Keep on seeing beauty – up close and personal – in your mind’s eye.
Known for her graphic color intensive style, Lisl Dennis has experienced the world on editorial and commercial assignments in the travel and adventure, design and decorative arts, and in the hospitality and lifestyle industries. As a multimedia visual artist, Lisl’s optically intimate style in her retreat programs Creativity in Culture and StoryShards are trend setting. Her vibrant visual storytelling emphasizes the Moral Imagination as a central imperative in our fragmented world. As a freelancer based in New York City and Santa Fe, Lisl was an influencer known for expanding the definition of
travel photography. Her award-winning signature abstract visual sensibility characterizes her style to this day.
From 1968-1970, Lisl was the First woman staff photographer on the Boston Globe. Not a one-trick-photo-pony, her developmental journalism experience during tumultuous times set Lisl up for a worldwide career that embraced diverse disciplines on location in: photojournalism, narrative portraiture, travel and hospitality, architecture and interiors, still-life and the decorative arts more broadly.
In the early 70s, Lisl and her writer husband Landt Dennis, founded and hosted the Travel Photography Workshop in Santa Fe, which ran for twenty years. Sponsored by CANON and KODAK, Lisl hosted workshops, seminars, and creativity retreats nationwide. She taught at the New School in New York City.
Growing up in rural New Jersey, Lisl’s two older brothers included her in splitting wood in their forest acreage, ice hockey, Little League, and building tree houses. Lisl also drew on her childhood exposure and collaborations as the daughter of an interior designer mother and architect father. Her editorial credits include: Architectural Digest, House Beautiful, Country Living, World of Interiors, and Town & Country.
After being a columnist for Popular Photography magazine, Lisl became the Traveler’s Eye columnist for Outdoor Photographer. She reported on her rich worldwide cultural experiences at the intersection of creativity, culture, and destination photography. After 911, OP resisted Lisl’s reporting and points-of-view on global socio-political realities. Her stories did not promote idealized landscape-porn and wildlife imagery. At least editors and advertisers didn’t think so.
Lisl went on to a decades long worldwide editorial and commercial photography career.