Night vision

Amateur-taken night photos rarely turn out well. The blurry, runny images we snap with our 35mm cameras usually end up in the garbage, our hopes for capturing spectacular evening images dashed.

Michael Kenna built his career on moody, black-and-white photography taken at dawn, dusk and pitch-black night. His chilling, atmospheric prints of the snowy Russian countryside, French architecture and Easter Island carvings are among the featured works in Kenna’s new exhibition at Jackson Fine Art this fall.

The artist’s peopleless landscapes hover with an air of anticipation. “Waiting for the actors to come out, he has been quoted as saying. “The still moment between events. His exposures take from 45 minutes to eight hours to capture the eddying currents of light, wind and water.

The large stone heads of Easter Island are especially eerie through his lense as they sit in the early dawn, silhouetted against the glowing sky. Often it’s hard to determine which are night or day photographs, the long exposures suffusing the prints with light.

Kenna is no stranger to Atlanta. This is his fourth show at Jackson Fine Art, and the 48-year-old English photographer’s small-scale, meticulously printed scenes also recently were included in the High museum’s exhibition Chorus of Light: Photographs from the Sir Elton John Collection, Elton having acquired more than 400 prints by the artist.

Photographs by Michael Kenna will be on display Sept. 21-Nov. 3 at Jackson Fine Art, 3115 Shadowlawn Ave. Tues.-Sat. 10 a.m.-5:30 p.m. Opening reception is Sept. 21 from 6-8 p.m. Kenna also will speak in conjunction with the Atlanta Celebrates Photography lecture series Oct. 18 at 7 p.m. at Rich Auditorium, Woodruff Arts Center, 1280 Peachtree St. 404-233-3739.??