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By Galen C. McBride
Rappahannock News Staff Writer
With freelance photographer Charlie Tompkins of Washington, Va., it is hard to tell where the art begins and the man leaves off, where technology merges with the spiritual and transcends the simple mechanics of snapping shutters and exposing film.
“There is a big artistic component to my personality,” he explained, a metaphysical side that makes photography “more than a career. Photography is a part of who I am.”
Tompkins’ Main Street gallery of traditional blackand-white photographs is a haven from what he calls “the yamma-yamma of modern life.” Each picture is a little slice of time and emotion, frozen forever in metallic silver. Photographs, unlike paintings or sculpture, “take you where the artist was emotionally at the time. You are drawn to see the world as the artist saw it.”
The many land and riverscapes on display in the gallery reflect this concept of “emotional reality.” In some, like “Jackson Falls - downstream, August 1992,” the feeling of rushing water is so intense that a sensitive viewer can actually feel the movement and icy coldness of the water. What is truly remarkable, though, said Tbmpkins, is that “the place does not really look like that.”
Tompkins compared the experience to hearing songs recorded by different artists. Though the words and music are the same, each singer — Bob Dylan, Judy Collins, or Peter, Paul and Mary — brings his own perspective to the recording and affects the listener in a unique way.
Tbmpkins credits much of his skill and artistic interpretation to his one-time teacher and mentor, Ansel Adams. By observing Adams, he learned to take his art seriously. Much of
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