Artist Talk: Jonathan Ottke, May 23rd, 2019 6:30 – 8PM

Atist Talk with Jonathan Ottke: May 23rd, 2019: 6:30-8PM.

Jonathan Ottke lives by Lake Braddock in the Washington DC area where he took many of the photographs in this series. He has lived in many places including in Waldenbuch, Germany, Nairobi, Kenya and Vienna, Austria. His travels and his training as a biologist affect his art. He has exhibited in numerous exhibitions in the Washington DC region including Falls Church Arts, Art Enables, and Del Ray Gallery. He has an M.S. in Biology from George Mason University with a focus on environment microbiology and a B.S. in Fine Arts and German from the University of Virginia. “In a Drop of Water” is his first solo exhibition.

These series of photographs of water taken by Lake Braddock focus on the small often overlooked beauty that is in the details of nature. Raindrops falling on a leaf, a blooming flower after a rain, the frozen lake, are all the sources and materials of these photographs.

Jonathan takes inspiration from William Blake’s quote “see a world in a grain of sand and a heaven in a wild flower”.

“With my photography, I observe the world closely around me looking for the beauty in the everyday. I am especially interested in the spiritual implications of materials in art and the way we create the world every time we see it anew. I hope my photography gives people a timeless, universal feeling and shows the otherworldly in the everyday.”