I bet you were expecting to see a picture of a dam…the Grand Coulee Dam, to be precise. Sorry, this photo was taken in the town of Grand Coulee, WA, just south of the dam. The plethora of power lines in the photo all originate from the dam. The huge dam supplies a great deal of electricity and irrigation water to Central Washington.
However, this is a sunset photo, as you can easily ascertain. And while I normally avoid photographing power lines, they work in this image. The photo is titled,”Power” and refers not only to the electrical power flowing through these lines, but to the power of the sun and the power of a forest fire.
You see, the sun is behind a thick veil of smoke which consumes the entire horizon…the result of a massive forest fire several miles away near Lake Chelan. Nature uses fire to replenish itself and renew the cycle of life in a forest. It takes a long time for that process to unfold, which probably explains why it took so long for man to understand the value of these great conflagrations.
Once, up in the Canadian Rockies, I took a nature walk through a burned out forest. It had been at least 10 years since the fire…and I could see nature replenishing itself with lots of new growth. The undergrowth had all been burned away, but the ashes supplied vital nutrients for the new trees and plants. Nature is a miraculous process.
Another unintended consequence of a large forest fire is that is supplies plenty of smoke to make beautiful sunset scenes for photographers. Smoke blocks much of the sun’s intensity…so much so that it is easy to stare directly at it. Thank God I had my camera with me this day so I could take advantage of Mother Nature’s gift.
PS: This photo was originally taken on film, then computerized with a scanner.
(To see a larger version of this photo, just click on the image)
To see more of my work, both in photography and digital painting, please visit my website, www.corkrum.com
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