Lake Series: Looking Over Time

Lincoln Schatz presents, Lake Series: Looking Over Time, a new edtion of fine art photography exploring the landscapes of Lake Michigan across three seasons. These photographs, curated by Schatz from his larger Lake Series project, create a story of Lake Michigan told over time.

Lake Series, February 2nd, 2024

The photographs found in this edition explore the ever-shifting nature of this mercurial and beguiling place. The lake is a dynamic subject, constantly changing form and character, always under the influence of weather and time. The lake mirrors, absorbs and transforms itself in relation to the world around it. Because of this transitory nature, the lake becomes an active partner in the making of these works.

Lake Series, February 9th, 2024 & Lake Series, April 2nd, 2024

“The lake rewards those who return again and again to its shores. Lake Michigan reveals qualities in its character that continue to astonish me even after all these years. It is what compels me to photograph it to this day. Lake Series: Looking Over Time is about patience, about studying and exploring the dynamism of this single subject. Color, light, weather and time all work together in varying degrees to create the fleeting landscapes that I photograph.

I am struck by how the transitory nature of the lake continues to reveal something new to me with every passing season.”

Lincoln Schatz

Lake Series, March 12th, 2024

Lake Series: Looking Over Time, is an extended portrait of a place over time, a way of working that Schatz has employed during his career as an artist. Born out of this engagement with time as an artistic tool, Lake Series: Looking Over Time functions as a meditative visual diary studying the complexity of Lake Michigan with attention and care.

This edition slows time, and encourages viewers to become lost in the details of these medium format photographs. To take time in contemplation, allowing the eye to trace the curve of wave in the water or the edge of a cloud in the sky. With contemporary life filling with its distractions, fast pace and focus on the instantaneous and the immediate, this edition asks for a different type of contemplation.

Lake Series, April 10th, 2024, Lake Series, May 23rd, 2024 & Lake Series, March 13th, 2024

Lake Series, June 26th, 2024 & Lake Series, May 28th, 2024

In Lake Series: Looking Over Time, we witness changes to the lake that occur on a timescale that stretches across nine months. The lake reveals its complexity when approached with the patient, slow and reflective practice of Schatz. By employing a few simple rules for how the series would be photographed, established at the beginning of the Lake Series edition, Schatz has been able to delve into the profound dynamism and character of Lake Michigan in his fine art photography.

Lake Series, June 5th, 2024

Weather patterns, rotating seasons, climate change, erosion, human intervention, time and many other factors each play a role in the continually evolving nature of this waterscape. Each season brings new aspects to the relationship between camera, air and water.

Lake Series, January 19th, 2024 & Lake Series, January 9th, 2024

“I began this edition as an extension of my new media practice, seeking a subject outside the walls of the studio. My new media work had focused on algorithms, chance and repetition as the tools to create generative video portraitures of people and places over time. With the Lake Series, a similar set of rules were employed from which the edition continues to be created today. I find that within these rulesets there is an enormous range of possibility.”

Lincoln Schatz

Lake Series, September 3rd, 2024

Humans have shaped much of the western shoreline of Lake Michigan. In particular, the land that sits between the eastern edge of Chicago and the lake. Many of the places that Schatz photographs the lake from are entirely man made. The contours of the shoreline reflecting the desires, needs and wants of humans in relation to the lake. But the lake itself resists these attempts at control and out on the water the human hand is hard to discern. It is that distance from shore, away from the human, that Schatz focuses his camera.

Lake Series, January 14th, 2024, Lake Series, July 25th, 2024 & Lake Series, May 7th, 2024

This intervention at the water’s edge occurs in both subtle and dramatic ways throughout the public parks that act as a buffer between the city and the lake. By choosing to remove the land that sits alongside the lake entirely from the frame, the resulting photographs allow the landscape to open before his lens uninterrupted. This decision by Schatz enables the expansive and immersive qualities of one of the world’s largest freshwater lakes to be placed center stage.

Lake Series, July 9th, 2024

“A lot of change is undramatic growth, transformation, or decay, or rather its time scale means the drama might not be perceptible to the impatient.”

Rebecca Solnit, How Slow Change Can Be Radical Change

Lake Series, August 26th, 2024 & Lake Series, February 8th, 2024

The photographs found in Lake Series: Looking Over Time begin in January of 2024. Starting deep in winter this collection stretches through late summer. Each photograph from this edition by Schatz informs the next. Every day deepens Schatz’s, and in turn our own, understanding of Lake Michigan.

Lake Series, January 17th, 2024

Lake Series: Looking Over Time and the Lake Series are ongoing editions of photographs of Lake Michigan. Information on purchasing and framing options can be found here.

Lake Series, August 7th, 2024, Lake Series, July 16th, 2024, Lake Series, January 16th, 2024