Earlier this year, a retired member of ACC’s faculty, Colorado poet, essayist, and photographer Kathryn Winograd released a new book tilted This Visible Speaking: Catching Light Through the Camera’s Eye, that takes on a unique format, combining the genres of photography and journaling, as well as adding quotes from writers and artists. 

Kathryn Winograd was a prominent member of ACC, having taught creative writing and English full time at ACC for fifteen years. She was also chair of the English Department, a title now held by Scott Guenthener. In addition, she ran the Writers Studio for twelve of those fifteen years. She retired from ACC before the start of the coronavirus pandemic.

It was at Christmas before the start of COVID that Winograd was gifted a camera by her daughter and son-in-law. She then started to watch photography classes from places such as National Geographic and started to take pictures herself. 

Winograd’s new book, This Visible Speaking: Catching Light Through the Camera’s Eye showcases the photographs she has taken around her cabin in Victor, Colorado and near her home in Littleton located near the South Platte River. The photographs specifically focus on the beauty of the Colorado wilderness. The book is structured in a unique way: a photograph followed by a quote from a writer/artist from the past or present, and then a journal entry reflecting on the photograph, and then another photograph followed by another journal entry. 

Each photograph comes with a story to tell about the circumstances that led to the photo being taken. A photo found on page nine depicts a deer staring directly up close into a wildlife camera that Winograd had attached to a tree, hence creating a “Deer Selfie”. For many of the photographs, Winograd used an app called Waterlogue (which is available to purchase on the app store for $4.99) to make the photo appear in watercolor which enhances the beauty of the photographs in certain ways. One photograph that was especially enhanced by the watercolor app can be found on page 33, the buds on a redbud tree it depicts appearing to glow by the watercolor effect. 

The photographs also show Winograd’s ability to find the beauty in things that would be considered unsettling to some. In the book, there is a photograph titled “Owl Head at Beaver Creek” of a decapitated owl head that Winograd found. At first, that image might sound gruesome but the photograph of it is far from that word. Perched on a rocking chair, the owl head is depicted in a way that it appears to be “sleeping”. Unfortunately, the photograph is what she has left as another bird took off with the head. She has also used other interesting and fragile items which she refers to as “gifts from nature”, such as a hand from a mole’s skeleton and a paper wasp nest which she has added to her collection in what she refers to as her “dead box”, a trunk she found in the barn on the Indiana farm she grew up in. 

Winograd’s combined use of her writing and photography skills has created a work that’s a must-read for those interested in nature photography but also those interested in nonfiction. While having personal reflections on each of the photographs, Winograd has also beautifully crafted a tribute to the beauty and surprises found in the Colorado wilderness. 

The book is available to buy now on LuLu and Amazon, (the author recommends that it be bought on LuLu as it prints the book on better material). The links to both options can be found below. 

This Visible Speaking via The Lulu Bookstore:
https://www.lulu.com/shop/kathryn-winograd/this-visible-speaking-catching-light-through-the-cameras-eye/paperback/product-7kgj42r.html?q=winograd&page=1&pageSize=4

This Visible Speaking via Amazon

https://www.amazon.com/This-Visible-Speaking-Catching-Through-ebook/dp/B0CRJWK9S4