#3 (a beautiful picture)

So, when asked to pick a beautiful picture (just one), I found the task to be more daunting than I originally expected. This is not because I don't think anything is beautiful, but because I think too much is beautiful. I have realized that I am constantly in awe of the world and its beauty, and picking one picture to analyze just doesn't seem to do it justice. So, this being said, I chose to analyze this picture because of its natural beauty, and I realize that this beauty would be described differently by each person viewing it. I'm not a photographer, but I would imagine that my photographer friends would surely comment on the angle or lighting of the picture (or perhaps other more detailed elements that I know not of). Needless to say, I don't see this when I view this picture. I see grass, water, and Sun. Yet, somehow this simple summary does this picture no justice. The beauty lies within the contrasting elements. I enjoy the three stark stages of grass, water, and then Sun. They seem to embody the transition between land, sea, and air. The colors of the scene highlight the inherent beauty quite literally, with orange hues illuminating the background and the exquisite and intrinisic shadow at the forefront. The Sun is what allows the transitions of the scene to truly show and the beauty to arise. In addition to the simple visual attractions of this work, I think it is beautiful because it seems to represent to me that there is hope. It can be seen as a highly symbolic photo about overcoming darkness, or life's journey into the Sun, or the sky. This beautiful picture can be interpreted in a thousand different ways based on the individual personality of the viewer, but I think that very few would ever interpret this as ugly. They say that "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" for a reason, but sometimes beauty can even surpass viewpoints. (Credit to Jillian Moomaw for this picture.)