I am moved to use nature as more than just a place where a nude is photographed. In my work, the natural setting becomes an integral and fundamental aspect of the image. Nature enhances the image and interpretation of the nude, and the nude (also a natural element) enhances the image and interpretation of nature. Ideally, there is a synergism between the two wherein the effect of the whole image is even more meaningful than either alone. The natural setting and the female form each becomes a lens through which the other is viewed, intensified, and interpreted.

Nature and nude thus come together as dual natures to reveal more about each of them than we knew or were aware of before. So, the female form might make one see or appreciate an aspect of nature that is not obvious otherwise, such as the shape of a decaying tree trunk, the curve of a rock, an erosion pattern, a shadow on water. Likewise, the natural setting, or even just the nature of light, might reveal to us or make us appreciate the human form, or some aspect of it, differently.

I’ve found that sometimes the natural setting stimulates an expressiveness in the model, in her psychic or physical persona, which might otherwise have never been exposed or captured. In this way nature becomes a conduit or pathway or even a language for personal expression which reveals something interesting or special about this person.

And perhaps too, the female form in the image causes us to be reminded of, and makes us celebrate, the past existence of a once tall and proud life form, or a geoform made thousands or millions of years ago, that now is fallen and reduced to parts, eroded and crumbling back into the earth, just as each of us will some day.

Chris Corbett