Terry O'Donnell Biography

In preparing this page the only tangible thought that persists in my head is the often repeated quote…
'Tis better to be silent and thought a fool than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt."
(A. Lincoln)

I now have a very simple and uncluttered approach to my work and to my life. Hasn’t always been thus, however, I have a name for it. ‘Cottlestone Pie’.
Some of you are scratching your heads now thinking, “I know that name…”. It’s from Winnie the Pooh and it’s his poem about simplistic interpretations, basically, some things are because they are. ‘A Bird can fly but a Fly can’t Bird!’ Is a typical line and that, sure as moonlight, is true.

For me it is all about what is in front of us, reality. More than that. It's about colour or color or couleur, spell it how you like in any language you like, it's all around us. we don't all see it though, we're to much adept at taking our immediate surroundings for granted, so what I am about is seeing what is in front of us, around us, in us.
To be honest, I'm tired of picking up magazines and seeing all the 'perfect blue sky over an azure sea and golden sand beach with not a soul on it' pictures, the impression that is portrayed to us is we need to be somewhere else just so we can appreciate something beautiful, we're told constantly that what we have isn't good enough, we need something better, need to be somewhere better. I don't buy into that. Take a look at the image below.

A boring photo of a dead landscape? Look again. As it wasn't to me when I saw it. Yes, it was a misty, murky morning one January in England but the sun, just climbing into the morning sky, caught the barkless tree to the right with a subtle red glow that stood out in the grey, lifeless, winter morning and the tree, stripped naked of it’s bark and exposed, cried out. 'Look at me, aren't I wonderful?' When I heard her I stopped the car and took this picture, because I thought she was wonderful too.
My point is, in the most seemingly boring or drab places, there is always something to see, something to find to give a little pleasure. We don’t need to spend fortunes to find beauty, its right there in front of us, in front of all of us.
The ‘photo-shop’ stuff? I do that too, look at the Photo Art pictures, its not a con as such but it can be. In using it to produce imaginary images to entertain and decorate, it's a wonderful bit of kit only constrained by imagination. For marketing, with a little manipulation in the photo software on this notebook, yes, a notebook, not some huge capacity million dollar computer, it's a breeze to turn the rotten into the succulent and the crowded beach into the desert island paradise.

When I take photographs I generally like the image the way the camera got it. I’m no techno, I don't have the patience, nor am I a ‘point and shoot’. More importantly, I don't fire up the photo editing programmes on this computer to create an image that just wasn't there! (My Equipment is shown in the information page). Most of the time there's no need to, if you look and see.
I love the diversity and inter-dependency of this planet, the natural world has evolved and survived for millions of years and it leaves me awe struck when I stand by a river and think. 'This is the same water that dinosaurs drank'. Because water never changes; it freezes, it boils, it gets dirty and it gets clean but the same volume of water is here now as there was sixty million years ago and it'll be the same in sixty million years from now. Mountains formed by the ever moving plates beneath our feet. Some still growing, some getting smaller, some yet to be born. I can go on for pages and pages but it's better that I just beetle along in my own sweet way and take some pictures, then show them to you. Because pictures can say it far better than I ever could, as long as you look & see.

Oh yes, about me, not much to tell really, apart from holding myself in complete contempt, having no redeeming features what so ever and being angry at having wasted so much of my life, I now live in France but was born and raised in England. Had formal training in photography at Blantyre House. Although no formal training as an artist as such, I did have a lot of brilliant support and guidance from a true Artist named Rosemary Davis.
I have to say this though, it's not really about me. (If I told all about me your hair would fall out, mine has) It is about capturing the image, the moment and once that is done, more importantly, it’s about sharing it with someone else.