Capturing everyone on film, from groundskeepers to kids at play, psychoanalyst and photographer Gary Grenell will present 32 of the 85 portraits that comprise his "Five Blocks to Green Lake" series through Oct. 30 at City Hall.
Innocent, yet intense
Since 1993, Grenell has snapped environmental portraits of people he encounters within five blocks of his home near Green Lake. One of his older photographs, "Boy with Basketball," will be on display.
"I thought the lighting was beautiful," Grenell said of the photograph. "There was a sense of innocence about him, but also intensity."
"Green Lake Gothic," his photograph of a Russian immigrant couple, which earned him a finalist award in the Photo Review magazine competition last year, also will be on display.
"Green Lake is my neighborhood, my home and the epicenter of my photographic world," said Grenell, a resident of the area for about 20 years.
Understanding human nature
Although Grenell currently works as a psychoanalyst in Madison Park, for the last 35 years his avocation has been photography.
"Practicing psychotherapy helps me be more accepting of people, and that has helped my photography," he said. "My pictures are trying to understand something about the human condition, trying to understand something about people."
Grenell uses only natural lighting, and the image is captured within five minutes, usually between May and September. During the winter months, he develops them in his own darkroom and prints them.
It may be the lighting or something interesting about the subject, such as their clothing or face that catches his attention, but to snap a picture, Grenell noted, the subject must be willing.
"They are at first bewildered and confused, and they don't know why they were selected," Grenell said. "But they sense my goodwill about it."
In exchange, he presents his subjects with their portraits mounted and framed.
"Somehow Gary has managed to point a camera at these people, yet he has stirred no disquiet, no self-protectiveness," wrote Dr. Kathy Knowl-ton, in "The Forum," a psychoanalytic journal. "In fact, the people looking out are the ones who seem to be observing. They have the authority of the watcher, not the reactiveness of the watched."
From yearbook to photo galleries
Grenell follows in the traditions of street photographers Henri Cartier-Bresson and Diane Arbus, as well as photojournalist W. Eugene Smith, all of whom have influenced Grenell's photography work since he learned of them in the 1970s.
Grenell, 52, got his start as the lead photographer for his high school yearbook and news weekly and is largely self-taught.
Area galleries have featured his work, including Seattle's Photographic Center Northwest, Fotocircle Gallery (of which he was a co-founder), Benham Studio Gallery, Phinney Center Gallery and the King County Arts Commission Gallery (now known as 4Culture Gallery). "Five Blocks to Green Lake" is an ongoing series.
"It will never be done because I don't know what's next," Grenell said. "I think there's more good photographs to be found at Green Lake."
The exhibit
"Five Blocks to Green Lake" will be on display through Oct. 30 in the City Hall lobby, 600 Fourth Ave. For more information about the exhibit, call 206-684-7171.
For additional information about Gary Grenell, visit www.grenellphoto. com.
Jessica Davis can be reached via e-mail at needitor@nwlink.com.
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