Artist's Statement

Light, color, and form are the elements I use to capture your attention. My landscape photographs of Marin and Sonoma counties and the neighboring region draw you in to notice the texture of a grassy hillside, an oak tree shrouded in fog, or the way sunlight reaches across a field. I strive to heighten your perception. I encourage you to look deeper.

My challenge is to capture images that are not only beautiful but also allow you to experience that beauty as I did out in the field and to have that experience evoke thoughts, feelings, or memories. If the observer stops, looks, and stays with the photograph—then I have accomplished my goal.

My photographs are often mistaken for paintings, but they are in fact straight photographs taken without filters. No “painting” is done on the computer. I usually do little or no manipulation and print the full frame. I rely on available light, which best reflects what I am actually seeing. To ensure that my work will last for generations, I use an archival pigment printer, archival photographic paper, and museum quality mats.

I have viewed the world with heightened attention to light, color, and form most of my life. I first studied photography in high school, where I won several awards. At the University of California at Santa Cruz, I was admitted directly into the advanced photography courses. I went on to study photography and art history in France.

I grew up in California’s Central Valley wine country and currently live in Northern California’s Sonoma wine country with my wife, Moira, and our four cats and four chickens. I’m a member of the Sierra Club, the Sonoma Land Trust, the Marin Agricultural Land Trust, and many other arts and environmental organizations.

I worked in the computer field for a long time before returning to photography, which has always been my passion. Now, with over 20 years of experience, I concentrate fully on fine art photography and specialize in landscapes. My continual challenge is to capture beauty in a way that inspires others to look deeper and experience a renewed sense of awe of the world we live in.

Hunting for Pictures in Point Reyes - 2009

Biography

Lance enjoys capturing images that are not only beautiful but encourage others to notice things they otherwise may not, such as the dramatic play of light and shadow cast by clouds on rolling hills, the patina of mosses on an abandoned barn or the explosion of fall color in a vineyard.

Since leaving the computer field five years ago to pursue his over 20-year passion for photography, Lance has become an avid explorer of Northern California’s less traveled back roads and the rural beauty they lead to. He shares these bucolic settings he so intimately knows through his fine art photographs and photography workshops, taking his students to little known places in Napa and Sonoma’s Wine Country as well as the pristine West Sonoma and Marin coasts.

Lance first studied photography in high school in California’s Great Central Valley where he grew up. He was admitted directly into the advanced photography classes at the University of California at Santa Cruz upon presenting his work to the head of the photography department. His sense of beauty and aesthetics became more finely honed while studying abroad in France, where his double major of politics and language took a backseat to his study of photography and fine art.

Lance’s photographs are often mistaken for paintings even though he shoots without using filters and performs little or no computer manipulation. He relies on available light, which he believes best reveals what he is seeing, and he generally prints the full frame. In 2002, Lance transitioned from film to digital photography but continues to shoot in the tradition of Ansel Adams and Edward Weston striving to keep alive the depth and clarity of their photographic visions.

Lance has won several awards for his work and his photography has appeared in numerous Northern California publications. His works hang in private collections in over 30 states and internationally throughout Europe. Currently, two of his photographs depicting the North Bay’s rural beauty are featured in Pottery Barn’s “Art to Collect Series” comprised of works by renowned photographers of the past century.

Lance is co-founder of the Riverfront Art Gallery located on the waterfront in the charming town of Petaluma The gallery won “Best Gallery in Sonoma County” within months of opening. Lance lives in Sonoma County with his wife, Moira, and continues to marvel that he can refer to its bucolic back roads as his “office.”