58-year-old Steven Smith has spent three years focusing on photography at Colorado Mesa University. Smith excelled at this activity, with his work now being displayed around the town. Smith came to Grand Junction after being in the military for 20 years and then teaching in upstate New York. Smith’s wife wanted to move closer to her home, Hayden, Colo., and the couple compromised on Grand Junction.
Smith is working toward a degree in photography due to inspiration from CMU photography professor, Forrest Zerbe.
“He took my pictures to ‘wow’,” Smith said.
Smith has had several hobbies over the years, including music and painting.
“I am in freshmen classes because I missed all the basics,” Smith said. “I love it so much I just want to learn about it.”
Smith has three shows coming up for the 2017-2018 year. The first show is Friday, Sept. 1, at the Raw Canvas in downtown Grand Junction. Here, Smith will display around 16 photos.
“I wanted to have something that worked with their ‘scene,’ so I pulled a couple pictures of ballet and replaced them with a picture of the moon, a lightning storm, and will still have at least 10 photos of CMU dancers,” Smith said.
Smith took photos during last Spring Into Dance concert. Smith worked the live show for a theater department sound class and brought his camera along.
“I always have fun experimenting with long exposure photography,” Smith said. After the first day of rehearsals, he spent the following days seeing what could happen with leaving the shutter open.
“I worked to see what I could make happen compared to a happy accident. Spent four days perfecting my technique,” Smith said. Motion photography is difficult because no one is holding a pose. There is more thinking involved, but the pictures can turn out beautiful.
“In motion photography, you don’t see a lot of faces, just the movement,” Smith said.
After the photos were posted, the CMU Theater Department chose 10 of his shots for advertisement.
“People were very receptive with these photos,” Smith said. A few dancers really enjoyed the photos and told him if he ever wanted to take more photos, they would be willing.
Those photos will be incorporated into his other work in his upcoming shows. Besides the Raw Canvas show, Smith also will have art displayed at the Avalon Theater in 2018 and will have a display at the City Hall from April to July.
“It has been an amazing journey, going through this,” Smith said. “It really took off this year after joining the CMU photography.”
Smith hopes to continue working with dance performances but is also expanding his photographic horizons with working on portraits.
“I want to be able to do several different things,” Smith said.
Smith’s biggest goal for the future is to put artwork up in galleries in Aspen, Boulder and Denver.
“If I can attain this goal, it would be doing more than I ever thought I would,” Smith said.
