2025 In the Footsteps of Georgia O’Keeffe:
A Sheography Women’s Photo Workshop

WORKSHOP DESCRIPTION

Calling all the ladies! Since 2011, Colleen's all-women's workshops have helped inspire photographic growth, personal development, wanderlust, and life-long friendships. And Sheography™ aims to continue that, to help women of all ages, backgrounds, and photographic skill "Put the HER in the photograpHER®."

Join Colleen and other Sheographers™ for an exciting six-day women’s-only photography adventure based out of the Ghost Ranch outside of Abiquiu, New Mexico, where we'll literally be following in the footsteps of the renowned painter, Georgia O'Keeffe.

O'Keeffe began visiting New Mexico in 1929 where she found much inspiration for her work in the fantastical rock formations, the colorful hillsides, and expansive desert landscape. By the 1940s, she had moved to what is known today as the Ghost Ranch in Abiquiu where she created remarkable studies of shapes, forms, and patterns in abstracts and grand views of her surroundings. Although she did not work much in the photography medium professionally, her husband, Alfred Steiglitz, did and was a famous photographer in his own right (yet he never visited O'Keeffe in New Mexico...). She died in 1986 at the age of 98, but her spirit and legacy lives on.

Now it's time for Sheographers to learn from her by studying, living, and experiencing her world to better our own photography and world!

Our workshop will start with a welcome dinner on Monday evening followed by a casual get-together to discuss O'Keeffe's legacy and how we can leverage her approaches and techniques as inspiration for our own photography. On Tuesday morning through Saturday morning, we'll put our photography skills and workshop learnings in rousing locations on and around the Ghost Ranch property, visiting some the very locations O'Keeffe did to put our own spin on this breathtakingly beautiful desert landscape. To expand our knowledge and connection with place, we'll hear from guest speakers, walk through O'Keeffe's studio and home, and explore O'Keeffe's "backyard."

While we will photograph landscape scenes, instruction will put a special emphasis on creating abstracts in macro and intimate perspectives that transcend realism and incorporate individual meaning. After all, O'Keeffe said, "Even if I could put down accurately certain things that I saw and enjoyed it would not give the observer the kind of feeling the object gave me. I had to create an equivalent for what I felt about what I was looking at--not copy it."

As with all Sheography workshops, attendees will have ample opportunity to ask questions, experiment, and get immediate feedback through a blend of field-based, classroom, and image review sessions.

In an learning-intensive, supportive, and all-women's group, where pushing ourselves to try new things will be encouraged, attendees will learn how to:

• Use mindfulness techniques to sharpen the eye to pay attention to details in the land.

• "Fill space in a beautiful way" (per O'Keeffe's philosophies) by simplifying compositions into lines, shapes, and layers and convey contour/dimension, symmetrical and asymmetrical balance, patterns, etc.

• Identify tones in varying types of light throughout the day from sunrise to sunset and including midday light. O'Keeffe did not chase light; she put available light to good use!

• Apply special techniques like intentional camera movement, multiple exposures, and panoramas in the field to interpret the landscape beyond the literal.

• Use processing software to further develop one's vision using the initial in-field capture as a baseline and palette.

• Make deliberate compositional and technical choices by translating what you know, see, and feel into a personally meaningful photograph.

The workshop's curriculum will be developed from the participants interests (collected through a pre-workshop questionnaire) and tailored to both individual and group needs. All levels from beginner to professional--and all camera types from iPhones to fancy dSLRs--are welcome for what is sure to be an inspirational six days celebrating the life of Georgia O'Keeffe--and our own--through photography.

**IMPORTANT NOTE: We will be photographing both from The Ghost Ranch and surrounding public lands. The Ghost Ranch permits photographs created on their private property to be used for personal, non-commercial use only. Any commercial use requires prior permission from the Ghost Ranch Production Manager. If this is of interest to you, please contact Colleen to discuss further and to arrange. To read more about the Ghost Ranch's policy, visit www.ghostranch.org/commercial-photography/.**