Michael Fields hosting landscape photography exhibit this summer
The Good Earth Church of the Divine is hosting a summer art exhibition until Sept. 17, featuring the landscape photography of Jim Steele.
The exhibit is open Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and on weekends by appointment at Michael Fields Agricultural Institute, W2493 Highway ES, East Troy.
Steele is known to many as the manager of Plum Crazy on Broad Street in Lake Geneva. But he’s more than a local merchant: he’s also a visual artist.
“I have always drawn and sketched, since early childhood,” Steele said. “But my grandfather’s gift when I was just 14 was a life-changer. He told me to get something for myself that I really wanted. ‘Don’t blow it’ he said, ‘But really think about it.’
“I bought a 35 mm camera. My mother enrolled me in a summer darkroom class and I was the only kid. But it was magic; I could just get lost in there. There is magic in the darkroom that many today will never experience, watching those shapes emerge, being able to manager their density, their intensity.”
Perhaps it’s natural Steele would be an artist; his father is an accomplished woodcarver and watercolorist in Madison and his mother used to do rosemåling, an intricate decorative style of painting that evolved in Norway. From his parents, Steele said he got both patience and perspective on compositions.
Describing one large outdoor photograph he said, “I really paid for this one. You know I use a large format camera, with a cover over my head. In this shot, all the summer insects came up under the cover, into my eyes and ears and all over my face. Yes, I really paid for this one … in blood!” he said with a laugh.
Although this is Steele’s first one-man exhibition, he is no amateur. He has participated group exhibitions at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee and at the Performing Arts Center.
He taught photographic classes to adults in Milwaukee for a number of years and was a professional studio photographer for a decade, having earned his BFA (emphasis on photography) at UW-Milwaukee. Working in Milwaukee, he created ads for Miller Brewing Company, PGA, Wisconsin State Fair, Marquette University, ABB Robotics, Pfizer, Photography Unlimited and many more.
For more information, visit www.goodearthchurchofthedivine.org.
