Daily Photograph: A Shelter in Place Project 

It seems rare in history and certainly in more modern times, when the entire world faces a catastrophic circumstance with such universality, yet one transpired in the spring of 2020.  As all now know, as a result of the rapid spread of the highly infectious COVID-19 virus that could, to those infected, result in death or ongoing disabilities, to varying degrees substantially every person in the world was required to restrict their movements to within the space they inhabited, with outings limited to essential activities such as grocery shopping and necessary or emergency medical attention, and maybe in more liberal jurisdictions, exercise activities.  It is extremely rare for essentially all of humanity to have in common, something so unexpected or unique at the same point in time. 

As global pandemic events were rapidly developing and unfolding in mid-March, I was returning to the United States from a month-long photographic journey in the high Arctic, specifically in Svalbard, Northernmost Norway, and arrived on the day before the US enacted its travel restrictions on incoming flights from Europe. 

Upon my arrival in the US and based upon the rapidly unfolding, yet widely varying rules and restrictions being imposed by various states, the US government, and guidance offered by the public health officials, when I arrived in upstate New York at the rural home of younger family members, I entered a self-imposed 14-day quarantine within the house and property of my daughter, son-in-law and their 2-year old daughter.  Shortly thereafter, that was followed by the sheltering-in-place by the entire family that was required by the state. 

Along with our younger family members, I was fortunate to be with my wife, who had arrived from our home in Texas, as she had already planned to spend time with our younger family members, but as the ensuing days revealed, we did not know when or how we would be able to return to our home state of Texas.  We were fortunate, because unlike the millions in small apartments in cities around the world, we were on a rural 30-acre property in a sparsely populated area in upstate New York; we could take long walks and never encounter anyone else. 

Faced with the uncertainties and restrictions, but fortunately having ample photographic equipment from my trip in the Arctic, I determined that other than assisting in babysitting my 2-year old granddaughter so that our artist-daughter and metalsmithing-artist son-in-law could produce their work, to fill my time I would force myself to consciously and purposefully make a photograph each day I was there, yet without knowing how many days that might be. 

While on the surface taking a picture a day may seem like an easy undertaking, after recently coming to the realization that I was now in my 50th-year of consciously and purposefully taking pictures and thus had made plenty along the way, my goal of recent has been to not take pictures or make photographic images unless the subject-matter compelled me to do so.  And, having just spent a month in the harshest winter conditions only some 700 miles from the North Pole solely to make photographic images, challenging myself to make one every day with somewhat restricted subject-matter and locations was concerning.  At a minimum and at this point in my approach to photography, I put thought into each image before the shutter is released, so given the limitations, this project would no doubt be challenging. 

The images contained in this gallery are a selection from those chosen over the 50-day period I was sheltering-in-place in upstate New York.  What I came to realize during that time is that spring in that part of the world is slow to reveal itself and comes much later than I am accustomed to in Texas; winter holds its grip into April and even May.  And somewhat metaphorically, now almost a year later and in a new year with vaccinations being administered enabling the world to reawaken, while at the same time highly infectious variants of the virus COVID-19 are cropping up, these variants are much like the winter’s darkness relentless imposition into the reawakening that is the upstate New York spring.