By Juliet Haas
Iceland was a dream I never imagined would be realized, yet there it was. An offering to live in a remote farmstead nestled in the apex of a distant fjord miles and hours from the nearest market or village. The nearest people, the actual Farmer and his family, were a mere three miles away, but utterly removed from interaction unless we needed to be dug out of the snow or a landslide, which did happen the third week of our stay. I became an Artist in Residence. Part of this mysterious scenery, the magnitude of which can never be realized in endless frames of visual capture.
Geothermal Island is my Iceland. A dot in a sea of moments that weave a blanket of longing to return to that place again and see more, feel more. The rain soaked wind whipping at my face around the edges of my parka, the smell of mud and wet wool permeating the nostrils inside the sheep barn during lamb weighing. Stumbling through mounds of bog and sharp grasses to cross a field toward a waterfall you can never reach. The earth looks so soft until you touch it.
These images form an incomplete story of my experience and don’t begin to scratch the surface of the expanse I have yet to explore when I return to Iceland one day. Creating this body of work has left its indelible mark on my soul. This is the purpose of photography for me. That swath of color flung onto canvas igniting moments of genius we each possess and must embrace to live.
