For 38 years, Littleton’s Fine Arts Committee has started the
new year by sponsoring a competitive photography exhibit at Bemis
Library. The committee hires an outside juror to select the show
and award ribbons in varied categories, number determined by the
individual juror. The Best of Show winners receive the opportunity
to mount a two-person show the following year, where they can
exhibit a large number of prints.

The 2004 show opens Thursday, Jan. 22, with a reception from
5:30 to 7 p.m. at Bemis Public Library. It will be in place during
library hours through Feb. 26.

The downstairs library walls are filled with fine work in black
and white and color, illustrating the broad range of imagination
and powers of observation possessed by metro area photographic
artists.

Juror Shaun Gothwaite will conduct a gallery talk at 6:15 p.m.
today, Thursday at the reception, and will talk with individual
photographers. These sessions always include some discussion of
“how did you do that?” among photographers who attend.

Best of Show winner in black and white is Ronald H. Dahl for his
“The Church, Overshadowed,” which depicts a traditional brick
church, with precise architectural detail, against a towering
background of glass-covered skyscrapers. (Paul Colburn’s color
print of “Holy Ghost Church” depicts a similar theme.)

Dahl also placed first in black and white People/ Human Interest
for “The Bookseller,” a city scene with an elderly gentleman in
front of the legendary Shakespeare and Company bookshop in Paris,
surveying boxes of bargain books in front of the store. In the
forefront is a polished, curvy 19th-century iron sculptural piece,
a contrast to the straight lines of the storefront and
boxes.

“Island Woman” by Frank Lucero III is Best of Show winner in
color. A weathered woman leans on a worn windowsill, with peeling
paint, but showing bright color. Rich textures include her dark
skin and fresh pastel dress, a stove, wood – the picture tells a
story of a life.

Other winners include:

* Still Life, first; Sharyn Lebsack’s “Resting,” color, with
straw hat and jacket hung by a bright blue-green door next to a
shovel and other tools against a stained stucco wall, a rusty
bucket and earthy terra-cotta pot.

Still Life, second; “Metallic,” black and white by Jim
Digby.

* Landscape, first; “Bristlecone Pine on Windy Ridge,” black and
white, by Craig

Lewis, shows a gnarled, ancient pine, listing to one side from
constant wind.

Landscape, second; “Grave of Robert Brew” by Stephen
Blecher.

* Abstract, first; “Springform” by Jill Blake, a look up through
a rusty metal spring.

Abstract, second; “Adé in Motion,” black and white by Alicia
Savage.

* Architectural, first; a somewhat dizzying “Looking Up the
Stairs,” color, by Paula Onofrio, which shows spiral stairs aimed
toward a dome.

Architectural, second; “End of Time,” color, by Sharon
Harris.

* Nature/Wildlife, first; “Eye to Eye,” color, an in-your-face
portrait of a polar bear with piercing black eyes by Margery
Smith.

Nature/Wildlife, second; “Deli,” black and white, by Elaine
Ricklin.

Entry in this popular show is open to all professional and
amateur photographers – and there is always a mix. All techniques,
traditional, digital and digitally enhanced, are judged together in
color and black and white.

Juror Shaun Gothwaite

Juror Shaun Gothwaite, who has three small black and white
prints, “Battlefield of the Little Big Horn I, II, III,” exhibited,
had her work included in 16 group and solo exhibitions regionally
and nationally.

Awards include the Ernst Haas Fellowship at Anderson Ranch,
winner in Maine Photographic Workshops and many regional awards.
Her photographs have been exhibited in Denver at Pirate: a
Contemporary Art Oasis and Zip Gallery. She studied with Ruth
Thorne Thompson and works primarily with Pinhole and Diana
cameras.

She is an instructor and board member for Working With Artists’
Photographic Workshops in Denver, whose mission is “to enhance the
quality of life in the communities we serve by encouraging
individual expression and communication through arts
education.”

Gothwaite has developed youth programs for children 8 to 15
through Working With Artists, Art Students League of Denver and
Artreach “to provide young people the opportunity to explore the
art of photography.”