A Different Way of Looking

Having the opportunity to photograph the Heritage Garden has been one of the highlights of my life. The garden has given me more than subjects to photograph. It has introduced me to people, knowledge, and relationships that have become a big part of my life. It has also taken me beyond the garden itself, especially into the bogs and wetlands of Ohio. I suppose I have Guy Denny to blame for that!

Photographing flowers, however, didn't come naturally to me. In the beginning, I struggled to figure out how to approach them. It wasn't simply a matter of finding a pretty flower and taking a picture. I was trying to understand how light worked with the flower, how the surrounding colors affected it, and how to make the plant itself the reason for the photograph.

I'll never forget walking into the Governor's Residence one day and noticing several large photographs of flowers hanging on the walls. I actually laughed when I saw them. There it was. What I had been trying to figure out.

The flowers were unmistakably the subjects. They weren't lost in a busy composition or competing with everything around them. They were given room, beautifully lit and photographed with a confidence that I recognized immediately. Someone had figured out what I was still trying to learn.

Those photographs were Jane Rogers's.

I hadn't known her, but I had found a connection to her work. And as I learned more about Jane, I began to understand that her photography was part of something larger. A lifetime of curiosity, observation, learning, and patience. She studied plants, documented their growth, shared what she knew, and helped others recognize and appreciate Ohio's wildflowers.

I made a short film about Jane and the work she left behind. It's a story about photography, but also about the value of paying attention—and how one person's curiosity can become something others carry forward.