In this age of point-and-shoot digital super-cameras, it would be nice to think that your travel photographs could turn out as compelling as Blaine Harrington’s.
But unless the Loch Ness monster happens to wander in front of your viewfinder during a vacation in Scotland, that’s not going to happen.
At 56, Harrington is one of the premier travel photographers going, witness a list of honors that includes two wins as the Society of American Travel Writers’ Travel Photographer of the Year.
Not bad for a guy who started out shooting images for his dad’s postcard business and photographed his classmates for candid pictures in the Cherry Creek High School yearbook. (Class of ’73 — check it out, Bruins alums.)
Starting this week, area photography buffs have a chance to view his work. Harrington is the featured photographer at the “Unifying the World Through Color” exhibit that opens Friday at the Denver Photo Art Gallery at 833 Santa Fe Drive. The show runs through March 4.
Harrington’s journey to travel photography wasn’t exactly circuitous. By his middle-school years — he grew up in Cherry Hills Village — he had his own darkroom. Upon high- school graduation he made a beeline for the Brooks Institute of Photography in Santa Barbara, Calif.
He cut his teeth shooting motocross races and then fashion. His own love of globe- hopping eventually pulled him into the travel end of photography. He has shot for National Geographic and Fortune magazines, among others, plus a host of guidebooks.
His eureka moment that tipped him into travel photography? “I was living in Paris and would jog by the Eiffel Tower every day,” he says. “I’d see all these people aiming their cameras at it and it finally occurred to me that I could do that.”
Along with Paris, Harrington has lived in New York City, Zurich and Amsterdam. He has also spent considerable time in Africa and Southeast Asia. The spacious Littleton home he shares with his wife, Maureen, and two teenage children, Blaine IV and Lauren, is awash with his photos and keepsakes from around the globe.
“In my career I’ve been fortunate enough to have done well enough, but with enough peaks and valleys to realize that things are cyclical,” Harrington says. “It’s an important thing to not believe that you’re too hot.
“It’s been a pretty good lifestyle,” he says. “Basically I go where I want, shoot what I want.”
Harrington’s photos are characterized by artful composition, a studied patience and eye-popping color. His hallmark is supersaturated colors.
“The bottom line is I take a situation where the color is already pretty darn saturated, and make it more so,” he says. “It’s my style.”
“Still,” he adds with a laugh, “I have to know where to draw the line.”
Harrington is a prolific shooter. He returned with 5,000 images from a recent trip to Europe, and his switch to digital cameras six years ago streamlines the once-clumsy need to keep track of film canisters. (His film archives alone hold 150,000 negatives.)
“Other areas of photography could be more lucrative, but not as aesthetically rewarding,” Harrington says. “I’ve kind of become a chameleon. You shoot portraits where you can see into people’s souls if you make that connection.”
William Porter: 303-954-1877 or wporter@denverpost.com
Seeing the world in color
Blaine Harrington will be the featured photographer (along with supporting artist Abelino) at the “Unifying the World through Color” exhibit at the Denver Photo Art Gallery, 833 Santa Fe Drive.
The show opens 6 p.m.-10 p.m. Friday and runs through March 4. It will feature large, fine-art prints of his work from Burma, Bhutan, Fiji, India, Namibia, South Africa, Thailand and the U.S.
There will be a Jan. 21 artist’s reception at the gallery, where Harrington will give a slide show and talk about the stories behind the photos and how they were created. Gallery hours are 10 a.m.-6 p.m; Tuesday-Saturday; 303-744-7979. Harrington’s website is .
