Seeing the forest for the trees

“I’VE ALWAYS MOUTHED OFF about what’s going wrong with the environment,” says freelance photographer Kathryn B. Kolb ’83C, “now I guess I’ve had to put my money where my mouth is.”

Kolb, whose photographic rendering of elm leaves is featured on the cover of the Emory Wind Ensemble’s recently released compact disc, Diversions, has focused her camera and her livelihood on the trees of Atlanta and North Georgia. Her photographs–which catch the summer sunlight through the veiny undersides of leaves or the morning mist through the branches of a single, naked Bradford pear tree–may be seen in the halls of Emory’s Goizueta Business School, on the pages of a Georgia Forest Watch calendar, and on the walls of Atlanta’s Soho Myriad commercial gallery. One recent work, “Clear Cut, Chattahoochee National Forest,” offers a six-foot, ninety-degree view of a swath of land near the Chattooga River.

“I believe a single, individual photograph should have art and depth enough to tell the entire story,” says Kolb.–Sharla A. Paul

Photos courtesy Kathryn Kolb