James R Fatino Creative Photography

09/17/2026

SUNDAY'S ART FAIR HAS BEEN CANCELED.
I will let you know if I attend another Fair or Farmer's Market.

09/07/2026

A TETRAPTYCH STUDY IN ABSTRACTION

The second image is where this began—a close-up photograph of a double white peony I came across while walking around Indianola, Iowa.

As I worked with the photograph, I began thinking about Georgia O’Keeffe’s close-up flower paintings and the way she explored flowers beyond simply depicting them. At that scale, petals become shapes, curves become lines, and subtle changes in color and light begin to take on a life of their own.

I wanted to explore that idea through photography.

I took different sections of this single photograph and created four individual 10 × 10-inch panels, forming a tetraptych. The first image is a mock-up showing how the finished piece will be displayed with space between each panel.

What interests me most is that when the photograph is broken apart and enlarged, some areas no longer immediately read as a flower. They become studies of shape, color, texture and light.

It started with a peony I noticed on a walk.

09/07/2026

09/07/2026

BUXTON PARK — A STUDY

Lately, Buxton Park, Indianola, Iowa, has become something of a photographic study for me.

Rather than going somewhere new every time I pick up my camera, I've been returning to the same park and challenging myself to look at it differently. The fountain in the evening light and after dark. The gazebo surrounded by flowers. A chess table turned into a small story. A sundial photographed in the morning sun.

They're all within the same park, but each one asks me to pay attention to something different, light, color, composition, depth, or simply an object that people may walk past without giving much thought.

I've learned that you don't always have to travel somewhere extraordinary to make a photograph. Sometimes the challenge is returning to a familiar place and discovering something you hadn't really seen before.

Buxton Park has become that kind of place for me. A study in learning to see.

09/06/2026

AMONGST THE FLOWERS
The gem of Buxton Park, Indianola, Iowa

There are a lot of beautiful things to discover in Buxton Park, but for me, the gazebo is the gem of the park.

Surrounded by flowers and tucked beneath the trees, it’s one of those places that seems to change depending on the time of day and the light.

I photographed it during the golden hour, when the warm light was catching the woodwork and the flowers surrounding it.

Sometimes the most beautiful subjects aren’t far from home. They’re places we’ve seen a hundred times—and perhaps stopped really seeing.

09/05/2026

MEASURED IN LIGHT

Another little gem hiding in plain sight at Buxton Park, Indianola, Iowa.

I think a lot of people walk through the park without realizing this sundial is even there. I know I've passed things like this countless times without really stopping to look.

I photographed it in the morning light, when the sun was low enough to bring out the texture and age of the bronze, while the flowers behind it added a splash of late-summer color.

That's one of the things I've been enjoying about photographing Buxton Park, slowing down and noticing the things that are easy to overlook.

Sometimes you don't have to travel very far to find something worth photographing. Sometimes it's been there all along.