Agave; genus of monocotyledons, is an aloe-like native to the hot and dry regions of America.
A striking plant having a dense cluster of rigid fleshy leaves. Eye-catching as a single specimen, spectacular in a developed clump - but to a photographers’ eye, so much more. A delightful source of changing shapes, patterns, light and shade when inspected through a contortion of camera angles in the early morning light.
I hope the viewer will enjoy these prints of the Agave in my garden as much as I have enjoyed taking and printing them in the dark room.
Beryl Jenkins
NOTAN
LIGHT AND DARK HARMONY
Notan is a Japanese term that literally means "light-dark harmony". Artists use "notan studies" to explore different arrangements of light and dark elements in a painting without having the distraction of other elements like colour, texture and finer details.
Notan is the underlying abstract framework, or pattern of lights and darks, upon which the value structure of a painting is created.