About
I, like many before me, am fascinated by our vast landscape. As a culture, we travel long distances in our vehicles, soaking up the vistas mile after mile, interacting with nature from the comfort inside the vehicle, or at best, from the side of the road or a pull-off specifically designated for viewing the scenery. Here, the edges of nature are peeled back, cut and scarred. To the left, right or directly in front, there is usually a road or a path, hydro lines and poles, ditches, culverts, signs or billboards. This has become the norm. Landscapes framed by the manmade. We count on these human visual clues to give scale, context and meaning to what we are viewing.
I include both subtle and major human interventions in the frame of my images, forcing the viewer to consider the relationship of man to the natural environment, and how we experience it. The images are all panoramics of 180 degrees or more. Standing close, the width of the image fills the viewer’s peripheral vision and places them in the landscape forcing them to view what is presented with the whole of their visual field, just as if they were standing at the side of the road or on the trail. The lush, large prints push the viewer back to consider dimension and scale, then pull the viewer in close to examine and explore the infinite detail in sharp focus- foreground and background.
This series of images are from my various travels to some of Canada’s more rugged areas. They build upon and continue my series "PERIPHERAL VISION - AT THE EDGE OF CANADA". Other images in this body of work are panoramic landscapes from the Dempster Highway in the Yukon and Northwest Territories, Newfoundland, Ontario and British Columbia.
Photographer Matthew Plexman has surrendered to the pull of the Canadian landscape, seeking wilderness and wide open spaces to build his body of work in oversized panoramics.
As a master photographer, Plexman has been working with medium and large format photography for 30 years. With his partner he owns a studio in Toronto set up as a flexible space for full service photography production, but also as an event space and art gallery.
Plexman attended Ryerson Polytechnical Institute, Photographic Arts Department 1976-1980, graduating in 1980 with Bachelor of Applied Arts in Photography.
Contact
11 Carlaw Ave, Unit 4
Toronto ON
M4M 2R6
matthew@plexman.com
416-463-3914
Commercial Work
plexman.com