For 20 years, award-winning photojournalist Tanya Ackerman has lived in Pawleys Island, a historic seaside resort town about an hour-and-a-half drive up the coast from Mount Pleasant. Tucked between a broad tidal creek, salt marshes and the Atlantic Ocean, Pawleys is known by locals as “arrogantly shabby” for its landscape that’s home to a diversity of flora and fauna, families who have lived there for generations and vacationers who decided to leave the hustle and bustle of life behind to take up permanent residence in paradise. As a love letter to this vibrant place and the people who have brought her joy for two decades, Ackerman has curated a collection of photographs she’s taken around the island and compiled them in her recently-launched third coffee table book “Pawleys Island: Reflections of Light” (Class Publishing Division).
In “Reflections,” Ackerman showcases her talent for capturing fine details in the movements of time and place in varying light. Gracing the pages are a noble fox crossing the sand dunes, an elegant egret posing and a great blue heron taking flight. “Dawn patrol” pelicans dive-bomb the frothy water, sandpipers scurry along the sand, waves unravel and the tides leave behind treasures such as coral and whelks. Lightning strikes through the clouds, a waterspout spins offshore, a turtle swims out to the Sargasso Sea, dolphins frolic, an eagle perches in the fog, morning glories bloom, snow covers the beach, ice clings to a camellia, a ‘bowl’ of roseate spoonbills gather and a crescent moon rises over a palmetto tree.
In addition to pictures of nature, “Reflections” highlights classic beach experiences such as fireworks bursting against the night sky on the Fourth of July, a lone beach bike with a basket, sunrise and sunset seekers, friends and family gathering against a backdrop of pastel skies and a man walking his dogs on the beach.
Ever an adventurer, Ackerman has taken the images for the book from different perspectives and angles while flying in World War II fighter training planes, an amphibious hang glider and a helicopter, paddling around in a jon boat or simply walking around the island. In the true spirit of photojournalism, Ackerman, who insists on using her manual Nikon rather than a drone, said that while she is inspired by nature, she also enjoys traveling around the world to visit museums and study paintings, for which her photographs are easily mistaken. Perhaps fittingly then, her philosophy is “Life imitates art.”
To order “Reflections” and learn more about Ackerman’s work, visit tanyaackerman.com.
By Sarah Rose
Leave a Reply