In this article, Shane Hynan; the Artist undertaking a Digital Residency during July 2026, discusses some books and texts that were influential in the formative stages of his long term ‘Beneath | Beofhód’ series, which forms part of a Photo Museum Ireland Tour that runs until mid 2027.
‘Truth and Landscape’ an Essay by Robert Adams from his book Beauty in Photography.
In this essay Adams discusses philosophies on geography, subjectivity and metaphor and how they relate to landscape photography. In terms of subjectivity he discusses how a photographers background, their experience of a place and intuition about it based on perceptions of it or other similar places informs how they photograph a certain place and by doing so capture it truthfully.
“Only the artist’s presence in the work can convince us that its affirmation resulted from and has been tested by human experience”
He discusses the significance of landscape photography as metaphor and consequently as art in how it helps us see beyond geography and topography.
“We rely, I think, on landscape photography to make intelligible to us what we already know. It is the fitness of a landscape to one’s experience of life’s conditions and possibilities that finally makes a scene important or not”
Although written from an American perspective there are universal ideas and philosophies regarding the depiction of land and the nature of man’s relationship with the land. While making ‘Beneath | Beofhód’ I drew upon these ideas and often contemplated Adams correlation of hope and despair as analogous emotions.
“…landscape art, the main business of which is a rediscovery and revaluation of where we find ourselves.”
‘The Pond’ by John Gossage
This photobook first published in 1985, the subject of which is a pond on the outskirts of an urban area in the eastern United States deals with the interface between man and nature as well as the spirit of man itself. It feels like a very honest, mature and non-didactic account, depicting the pond and its surroundings as it is with minimal romance or judgement, rendering its account more believable.
In Robert Adam’s essay “Robert Adams on John Gossage’s the Pond” (from the book Creative Camera: 30 years of writing) he talks about living “with tragedy unresolved – unjustified, and not fully explained”, which seems to suggest accepting things exactly as they are right now. This is a philosophy I’ve often contemplated in terms of Irelands relationship with the bogs, how we have affected them and where we are right now.
“It is the incorporation of darkness into art that initially confirms to us, in our discomfort, the importance of art, and assures us that the hope the art offers has not been cheaply won”
Quote from Robert Adam’s essay “Robert Adams on John Gossage’s the Pond”
Link to view the Pond photobook here
‘Ten Miles Round’ by Jackie Nickerson
This is a photography project and photobook about the area and community around the Photographers adopted home in rural Ireland. It depicts the subtle bucolic landscapes of an everyday rural Ireland and provides a very intimate insight into the significance of place.
Although this project doesn’t deal with peatlands, the area of rural Ireland explored by Nickerson is quite similar to the central plain of the midlands that my ‘Beneath | Beofhód’ explored. Both are discreet unassuming landscapes disparate to the rural Irish landscapes of the Wild Atlantic Way and tourism advertisements.
