JTF (just the facts): A total of 9 color photographs, framed in white and unmatted, and hung against white walls in the main gallery space. A video installation is on view in the smaller project gallery.

The following works are included in the show:

• 5 archival pigment prints, 2017, 2021, 2022, 2023, sized roughly 46×37 inches (or the reverse), in editions of 6
• 4 archival pigment prints, 2021, 2022, sized roughly 73×59 inches (or the reverse), in editions of 6
• 1 three channel video installation with soundtrack, 2024, 25 minutes, in an edition of 5

(Installation shots and video stills below.)

Comments/Context: With the consequences and perils of climate change ever more apparent all around us, the seemingly simple act of making photographs of trees has become a more overtly political statement. Of course, we might argue that this has always been the case, reaching back to the 19th century survey photographs of Carleton Watkins and Eadweard Muybridge, and forward to the majestic landscapes of Ansel Adams and the clear cut forest pictures of Robert Adams. Images of trees ground us in a more expansive notion of time, their durability (and vulnerability) reminding us of our place in the broader cycles of life on this planet.

On and off for more than a decade now, Mitch Epstein has been making photographs of trees, and along the way, his trajectory has definitely moved more overtly toward environmental activism. In a 2012 gallery show (reviewed here), Epstein offered large scale black-and-white portraits of trees in and around New York City, documenting landmark specimens in various boroughs and neighborhoods with attentiveness and care. In the following years (as seen in a 2019 gallery show, reviewed here), he turned his lens to at-risk landscapes around America and the people trying to protect them, following protests and capturing views of places under environmental threat.

Epstein’s current show returns to patient large format portraits of trees, venturing out to California, Washington, and other distant locales in search of the most ancient (and sometimes massive) trees in the country. Working in color, his photographs capture both the undeniable grandeur of these elders and their current struggles, as seen in the charred bark of wildfires, the dryness of extended drought, and the eroded soil of rising waters. In one sense, these pictures are clearly gloomy document-them-before-they-are-gone exercises, but in another, Epstein’s images seem to offer heartening examples of durable resiliency in the face of trials measured in centuries not days. In this way, they try to be teaching pictures, asking us to look and then learn from what these tenacious survivors might have to tell us.

The swirled forms of bristlecone pines in California have been notably photographed by Ansel Adams and both Edward and Brett Weston, so when Epstein turns his camera toward these sculptural forms, he’s stepping into some well trod artistic pathways. In the two works here that take these pines as his subject, Epstein revels in their gnarled branches and torqued trunks, highlighting the witchy striping of the interior layers. When he steps back to take in the entirety of one gorgeous specimen, the feeling of individual portraiture (almost like the taking of a fingerprint) comes through strongly, with Epstein capturing a unique personality as seen in the particular array of its sharply twisted branches.

When Epstein pays attention to the giant sequoias and redwoods of California, their towering verticality becomes his most obvious compositional challenge. In one image, we look straight up at a fog-encircled redwood, with Epstein channelling the vertiginous upward angles found in some of Alexander Rodchenko’s photographs. In another, he uses a tiny figure placed at the foot of a charred sequoia to provide a sense of the immense scale of nature, in the manner of many 19th century Romantic paintings. And in a third composition, he uses a forest of thick sequoia trunks as a framing device, centering a younger sapling between the vertical lines, as though the older trees were protecting an infant.

Still other images are essentially color studies (with a nod to the subtle color tones of Eliot Porter), with Epstein building compositions around splashes of yellow leaves atop a bigleaf maple or the greens of moss and ferns that envelope a maple glade. And his image of a sitka spruce precariously perched on an eroding bank in Washington is perhaps the most overtly sad picture in the show, the grand evergreen seemingly holding on for dear life as the land around it washes away, its tangled roots grasping for stability on the disappearing sandy ground.

In the side room, Epstein bridges out from the static frame of photography to the time-based medium of video. In a three channel setup, he wanders though the forests of the Berkshires (in Massachusetts), meditatively capturing what he sees across the cycle of the seasons. The three screen arrangement allows Epstein to look at a given subject (a stand of trees, a babbling brook, some flowering bushes, a rocky outcrop etc.) from three different vantage points essentially simultaneously, stopping to notice the time-based details a single photograph can’t ever really capture – the whispering of the wind through the leaves, the ambient sounds, the shimmer of light, the passing of clouds, and even the momentary appearance of an ambling porcupine. The soundtrack to the installation is largely just the quiet rhythms of the forest, intermittently enhanced by the subtle metallic sounds of gongs and cymbals played by an improvising pair of musicians set up in the woods. Seen as an entire experience, Epstein’s video is an exercise in slow attentive looking at the complexity of nature, where pinecones, fungi, a passing hawk, the drip of rain, a melting icicle, a rumble of thunder, and a sliver of moon in the sky all catch our attention for a moment or two, before we pass onward to our next discovery.

One of the intriguing frictions to be found in this project is for all of Epstein’s measured looking, his precision, and his clarity, these photographs are surprisingly urgent. Each tree portrait feels altogether respectful and humble, but also hand wringingly anguished, given the fact that these awe-inspiring natural treasures are threatened to different degrees by our broader human lifestyle. It is this undercurrent of nuanced desperation that was my most notable takeaway from this show, with each picture communicating a frustrating state of fragility that should have been avoidable.

Collector’s POV: The photographs on view in this show are priced at $22500 or $45000, based on size; the video installation is priced at $60000. Epstein’s work has become more available in the secondary markets in past few years, but the volume of prints for sale has still been relatively small, with prices ranging between $2000 and $63000.