“Ancient Trees: Portraits of Time” is well-named. One cannot look at Beth Moon’s images of gnarled, overgrown trees and not feel the intrinsic gravity of time. Moon’s photographs are almost sculptural in the way they record light as it’s filtered through branches, absorbed by dense, massive trunks. As Todd Forrest (himself aptly named) of the New York Botanical Garden writes in an essay in the book:
It is not surprising that we are drawn to trees: they were our first homes and our first cathedrals, and they remain inextricably linked to our commerce and our culture. As mankind’s dominion over Earth has expanded and pushed wilderness to the brink of extinction, trees, particularly ancient trees, have taken on new meaning and new importance. We see something eternal in the veterans featured in Beth Moon’s portraits, something charismatic and worth protecting.
— Printers Row Journal editors
“Ancient Trees”
By Beth Moon, Abbeville, 104 pages, $49.95