Hello! My name is Rachel Whetzel. I have been taking pictures since I got my first camera as a girl. When I was a VERY little girl, my uncle let me sit with him in the dark room that my Grandpa Jack made for him. I remember the curtains that made everything dark, and waiting so excitedly for the moment when we would be able to turn on the red light. I remember the pinks and reds of the room that the light created on my skin. I remember how I would wait for the white sheets of paper to magically turn into pictures when they sat in chemicals. I remember the tongs that my uncle took the pictures out of their baths with. I remember the smells that the chemicals made. I love that smell. I remember the clothes pins that we hung the pictures up to dry with. I remember the strips of negatives and the way that black and white were opposite on them. I remember the magic. My uncle let me sit. In the RED. and the SMELLS. His pictures had magic. The red light had magic. Now days, there isn't any red light. There aren't any chemicals. There's no curtains shutting out every inch of light. There are no negatives. Photography has turned digital. But there is still magic there. In the grubby hands. In a smile caught off guard. In the silly faces. In rows of feet. In all the details that are captured. Look, and you'll see...... The magic is there.
It's my goal as your photographer to catch your magic. It's my goal to find it in the places that most photographers would ask you to avoid. It's in those moments when you walk away from the camera holding hands. It's in the details of a baby's ear. It's in the rush of a dash away from a wave. If you dare to venture with me... we will find the magic together.
