“Watching/photographing the sunrise on Lake Michigan this morning-pure life force! You have to make it happen every day!” – March 17, 2020
Courtesy of Lincoln Schatz
Lincoln Schatz is a native Chicagoan and our friend! We love his photographs which mimic what it is like to live with Lake Michigan in your back pocket. The enormous lake defines the city’s Eastern border. The vast skyline oftentimes casts beautiful reflections onto the undulating water. Different times of year bring about different images; one of the most startling is the look of the giant glaciers and the ice sheets that cover the fresh water below.
Lincoln Schatz (American, b. 1963), Lake Michigan, January 23rd, 2021
Image courtesy of: Lincoln Schatz
We absolutely love Schatz’ Lake Series! A quick glance makes it look as though the photographer enlisted a simple strategy to photographing Lake Michigan. A rapid glimpse appears as though the lake and the sky are equally framed and perfectly proportioned. However it isn’t that straightforward…each photograph takes into account “the human experience of place at a specific point in time.” Each click also references the physicality of temperature, wind, sound, and light. The horizon directs each photograph making the viewer think about the future, what is possible, and the reality of change.
Lincoln Schatz (American, b. 1963), Lake Michigan, February 17, 2021
Image courtesy of: Lincoln Schatz
We love this quote by Simon Schama, “Landscapes are culture before they are nature.” True enough, and especially poignant for Schatz’ works of art. As a lifelong lover of bodies of water, we count ourselves lucky that our fellow Chicagoan, Schatz, has such a muse so nearby. Perhaps he sums it up best, “Look east and you see the lake, only the lake. Turn around and you see Chicago.”
From Lincoln Schatz’ exhibit in our studio in 2018 – May 10, 2017, Lake Series, 2017, ink jet print – as installed in our reception area.
“That day on the lake had a dreamlike quality to it, filled with an ethereal morning light.” – Lincoln Schatz
Suzanne Lovell, Inc. had the great luxury of hosting Schatz and some of his works at our studio several years back. To say that this event was inspiration would be a vast understatement. Suzanne shares her thoughts, “I first met Lincoln when he shared his incredible log of many years of photography of Lake Michigan. It still astounds me that his imagery of the lakefront, which he memorializes each morning, always has a different expression than any other face it has shared. Be it ice or color, fog, or waves, the personality is individually expressive.”
Lincoln Schatz and Suzanne Lovell stand in front of his work Yell, Use Both Hands, 1995, oil stick on canvas drawing, from Lincoln Schatz’ exhibit at our studio in 2018.
In closing, “His paintings are some of my favorite pure expressions of shape and color. And his natural travels through the beauty of our land is spectacular. I also love that in some instances Lincoln will share poetic words with the beauty of his photography.”