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Wednesday Edition: Bryan Schutmaat

Lumber Mill by Bryan Schutmaat
8"x10" ($20) | 11"x14" ($50) | 16"x20" ($200) | 24"x30" ($1000)

Train Yard by Bryan Schutmaat
8"x10" ($20) | 11"x14" ($50) | 16"x20" ($200) | 24"x30" ($1000)

Unseasonably warm greetings, collectors! It's Youngna here today to introduce the work of Texas-based photographer Bryan Schutmaat. Bryan's work first caught our eyes when he submitted to Hey, Hot Shot!. Since then, many of us at team JBP have continued to return to his images, drawn to the exquisite lines, light, and imminent narrative born of his landscapes. Lumber Mill and Train Yard both come from the series Heartland, and reference two industries fundamental to the beginnings of America.

Bryan is a photographer who seems both part of the land and endlessly fascinated by it. He discovers new color palettes within the open plains by waiting for the sun to pass its peak and transform vacant landscapes with a painterly lushness that imbues a sky, road, or grassy field with tremendous vigor. He capitalizes on scale, filling the frame with the utter vastness of his surroundings. In what some might see as emptiness, Bryan recognizes a space that defines his relationship to the land.

Associate Director of Jen Bekman Gallery, Jeffrey Teuton adds:

Bryan's images are classic and cinematic without being distancing. I feel drawn in—not as a casual viewer of a passing moment, luckily documented by the photographer—but engaged in a story that is about to unfold. It is impossible to look away, because in my mind it seems that I am gazing at a moment right at the threshold. If I dare turn my head, I may miss what happens.

His images also carry a subtle hint of nostalgia that gives way to a more modern and compelling voice. This combination makes Bryan both an excellent photographer and storyteller—and, reflected in the two images here—results in an incredible life and vibrancy which, in others' hands, could be mundane and quiet.

Train Yard and Lumber Mill are both departure points for objects and people headed elsewhere. They pause, not knowing where they are going next, transformed by forces beyond their own control—off to become part of a larger story yet to be told.