Blog
I recently returned to the Olympic Peninsula for a weeklong visit — the place where my journey with photography began over 40 years ago. After receiving a brand-new Canon AE-1, I enrolled in classes at a local community college. We lived just south of Seattle then, so driving or taking the ferry out to the Peninsula was easy, especially in those days. Surrounded by moss-draped trees and shifting coastal light, I felt the same gentle pull that first drew me […]
I’ve never been one to make overtly political art—but these days, silence feels like complicity. As an artist and a woman, I can’t ignore what’s happening in this country. The rise of authoritarianism. The normalization of cruelty. The erasure of truth and history. I’ve seen these patterns before—in history books, in stories passed down, in places I’ve lived, and in nations that lost their way. Infrared photography is my way of revealing what most people don’t see. In a time […]
On April 11, the Black and White exhibition will open at 3 Square Gallery in Fort Collins, Colorado. The four images below have been selected for the show. Art in B & W 25 6th Annual Juried Exhibition Friday, April 11, 20256:00 PM Friday, May 16, 20255:00 PM 3 Square Art Gallery 2415 Donella Court Fort Collins, CO, 80524 The Art in B & W 25, 6th Annual Juried Exhibition will once again grace the 3 Square Art Gallery this April […]
The San Luis Valley and Mount Blanca are more than just landscapes to me—they are threads woven into my ancestral story, places where history, memory, and personal vision converge. With a family lineage that stretches back centuries, rooted in both Spanish settler and Indigenous ancestry, I feel a profound connection to this land. Every time I photograph its vast plains, shifting light, and the imposing presence of Mount Blanca, I am not just capturing a scene; I am engaging in […]
Gallery 6 photographer, Tony Eitzel and I will be showing work at the NKollective for the Month of Photography March 1-31! Please stop by if you live in Colorado and are in the area. Denver Post-The Hub
I was recently interviewed for an article on VERO, the photographic social media app, where I had the chance to share my journey through infrared photography. The conversation explored my artistic evolution—from discovering the magic of HIE film in my early days to creating ethereal black-and-white images that celebrate the American West and my deep connection to the land through my heritage. We touched on the challenges and rewards of working within this unique medium, how it has become a […]
The Photo Seen Podcast A few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of being invited back to Kat Shanahan‘s infrared podcast. This time, I was joined by the talented black-and-white infrared photographer, Nath Kaplan. We had a great time sharing our passion for black-and-white photography, covering a wide range of topics—from the types of IR filters we use, to long exposures, Lensbaby lenses, and so much more. “What a season it has been! Today we’re wrapping up with @starlitwaltz and […]
All artists experience cycles of creativity, with highs and lows shaping their journey. After a hiking injury last November, I found myself unable to lift a camera or carry a backpack for six months. As time passed, I gradually recovered from the pain in my ankle and shoulder, allowing me to return to photography. Yet, despite several local outings, I felt uninspired, and my images reflected that lack of enthusiasm. My good friend, Laurie Klein, suggested the injury might have […]
“No matter how sophisticated you may be, a large granite mountain cannot be denied – it speaks in silence to the very core of your being.” — Ansel Adams The Pikes Peak granite is a 1.08 billion year old widespread geologic formation found in the central part of the Front Range of Colorado. It is a coarse-grained pink to light red syenogranite with minor gray monzogranite, and it has a distinctive brick-red appearance where it outcrops. The granite gets its […]
The Outdoor Photo Alliance was founded with the mission to empower connection and growth among those with an affinity for outdoor photography. Discount Code: SHERRI100 We are kicking things off with a Women’s Winter Photography Conference in Estes Park, Colorado on February 6-9, 2025. Our conference will focus on creating connection, sparking imagination and inspiring creativity. As female outdoor photographers, we have repeatedly heard other women in the field express the desire to connect with others and so we decided […]
A few months ago, I was asked by the residents of Gallery 6 to show my infrared work in their gallery as a new resident. This Friday my imagery will be hanging on the walls of Gallery 6, in Santa Fe’s Art District, in Denver. Please come by First Friday, or anytime after, to view the art displayed by some incredibly talented photographers, and of course, mine. Grateful! Gallery 6 Denver Via Instagram and Facebook: INFRARED PHOTOGRAPHER SHERRI MABE OPENS […]
“Huddled in the North Atlantic between Iceland, Scotland and Norway, the Faroes — an 18-island archipelago and self-governing nation within the Kingdom of Denmark — captivates visitors the instant they land at the airport on the island of Vágar. Silence saturates the emerald green slopes and basalt cliffs. Sheep roam the grassy expanses that are sliced vertically by dark rocky threads caused by the erosion of streams. It’s hard to keep your eyes focused on the road as you behold […]
Shoutout Colorado, Sherri Mabe-Artist Hi Sherri, how has your background shaped the person you are today? Northern Colorado was home for my first 26 years, both my childhood and college years. I was born in Denver. Our family history dates back to the pioneers who settled on the eastern Colorado plains to become farmers, and also, to the Spanish settlers who migrated from the Santa Fe area to the San Luis Valley, becoming farmers and ranchers. During the 1930’s, my […]
In November of 2023, I will have a solo exhibit at the Garden of the Gods Visitor Center. This is such an honor for me, not only to be recognized, but to share my interpretations of the park I visited over 50 years ago as a young girl with my family. Back then, the drive to Colorado Springs via the new Valley Highway, was an easy journey from northern Colorado. My parents and grandparents would drive down to the North […]
Two of my images, Nuclear Family and The Graces, have been selected for the Best of Colorado Art show at the Depot Art Gallery, 2069 W Powers Ave., Littleton, Colorado. Exhibition dates are August 8th to September 9th. Opening reception will be August 18th, 530-730. About The Littleton Fine Arts Guild and the Depot Art Gallery: The Littleton Fine Arts Guild was founded in 1962 by 10 artists interested in painting. Today, it boasts more than 60 skilled artist members […]
Recently, I recieved a message from Olaf Sztaba, the editor of Elements Magazine. Olaf was inquiring about my image, The Dawning, and wanted it to be featured in the PHOTOS WE SHARE section of the May 2023 issue of Elements Magazine. The Photos We Share is a new area in the publication, “carefully selected by the magazine’s curation team.” “The monthly magazine dedicated to the finest landscape photography, insightful editorials and fluid, clean design. Carefully curated by the same […]
I am very pleased to have four of my images selected for the LAA National Photography Show and Sale May 26-June 4, with the Reception and Awards – May 26 from 6:00pm – 8:00pm Via the LLA: The Louisville Art Association is proud to announce that the entry process is open for the 2023 National Photography Show and Sale! With the return of our platinum-level sponsors Mike’s Camera and Duraplaq, we will be awarding over $6000 in cash and […]
The Lincoln Gallery and the Thompson Valley Art League presents the 2023 REGIONAL PHOTOGRAPHY SHOW (Black and White ONLY). This is a juried exhibit open to all photographers residing AZ, CO, ID, NM, MT, UT, NV, WY, AK, CA, HI, OR and WA. Three of my black and white infrared images were selected for this show. The Sierra, The Dawning and Earthborn. The Opening Reception is Friday, April 14, 2023 at 6:00 pm. The gallery will also be going live on Facebook […]
Via the Art District on Santa Fe: Gallery 6 is celebrating Month of Photography with two photography shows running concurrently through March. IMPRINT Colorado introduces three breakthrough Colorado photographic artists with their own show, the center piece of Gallery 6 Denver’s Month of Photography in March. Each of the artists won their space in a statewide contest run by Gallery 6, Denver’s only dedicated photographic art gallery. Robert Newman is a talented iPhone-ographer from Lakewood and captures 4-second exposures of […]
*Art of the State – Breaking News* IMPRINT CO CONTEST WINNERS REVEALED The Resident Artists of Gallery 6 Denver are delighted to announce the three winners of our inaugural IMPRINT Colorado photography contest. Skilled iPhone-ographer, Robert Newman of Lakewood, infra-red exponent Sherri Mabe from Colorado Springs and master-of-light Kent Youngblood of Denver all rose to the surface in a high quality competitive contest. Robert, Sherri and Kent will show examples of their winning portfolios at Gallery 6 during Month of […]
Last year, Life Pixel invited me to share my work via the Infrared Photography Gallery on the Life Pixel website. It was an honor to be among some of the very best infrared photographers who are also sharing their images via this gallery. I have used LP since my first exposure to the digital infrared world, and they are both helpful via customer service, and meticulus in their conversions. Please take a peek at the many talented photographers LP represents via this […]
My friend, Terrel Bailey, also know as Lifted Spirit, has invited me to exhibit two images with him at the D’art & Friends Invitational Group Exhibition 11/25/22 – 12/24/22. Opening day will be the day after Thanksgiving, Friday, November 25, from Noon – 9pm. D’art Gallery is a contemporary art exhibition space featuring 18 professional artists located in the Art District on Santa Fe, Denver Colorado at 900 Santa Fe Drive, Denver, CO. The mission of D’Art Gallery is to provide […]
Sherri Mabe, The Photo Seen Podcast Such an incredible opportunity to speak with Kat. In these situations, I am often nervous, think too much and am struggling over words. Kat made me so very comfortable, and she is a delightful human being who has created an informative service, via her podcasts, for the “invisible light world” of photography. Please check out the other photographers interviewed during her two seasons. There is some profound talent in the infrared photographic medium, […]
I’m honored to have Nuclear Family accepted to this exhibit on “Trees.” Of the 1,093 submitted images, 55 were selected for the exhibit. Juror | Kevin Tully Exhibition dates | April 29 to June 9, 2022 “Established in May, 2010, A Smith Gallery is located in Johnson City, Texas in the Nugent Avenue Arts District. The gallery exhibits the work of both amateur and professional photographers through juried and invitational exhibitions. A Smith Gallery along with the photography collective, Shootapalooza, created […]
Thinking back to my Seuss days with young children, it occurs to me that Joshua Trees have a strong resemblance to the Truffula Trees in the Dr Seuss book, “The Lorax!” “I am the Lorax. I speak for the trees. I speak for the trees for the trees have no tongues.” ― Dr. Seuss, The Lorax I made a visit to JTNP this past March. My first encounter with these trees was while driving across the Mojave Desert via Las […]
“There’s a place in East Texas where time stops. Off the shores of Uncertain, where the Big Cypress Bayou flows into Caddo Lake and the water is lined by moss-draped bald cypress trees, modernity has no place. The lake’s surface is dotted with lily pads and coated with duckweed. All around, brilliant water hyacinth blossoms. Along the shoreline a dense forest of hickory, ash, oak, pine and sweet gum trees grows. Within the water and surrounding woods a menagerie of […]
“The first experience of the plains, like the first sail with a “cap” full of wind, is apt to be sickening. This once overcome, the nerves stiffen, the senses expand, and man begins to realize the magnificence of being.”- Richard Irving Dodge, The Plains of the Great West (1877) “Native Americans tolerated wagon trains passing through their territories. Many pioneers would not have made it if it had not been for trading with the tribes along the trail. There […]
“Children are not like us. They are beings apart: impenetrable, unapproachable. They inhabit not our world but a world we have lost and can never recover. We do not remember childhood — we imagine it. We search for it, in vain, through layers of obscuring dust, and recover some bedraggled shreds of what we think it was. And all the while the inhabitants of this world are among us, like aborigines, like Minoans, people from elsewhere safe in their own […]
“He had seen the end of an era, the sunset of the pioneer. He had come upon it when already its glory was nearly spent. So in the buffalo times a traveller used to come upon the embers of a hunter’s fire on the prairie, after the hunter was up and gone; the coals would be trampled out, but the ground was warm, and the flattened grass where he had slept and where his pony had grazed, told the story. […]
In September I did an interview on infrared photography with Cynthia Haynes, the editor of David duChemin’s Craft and Vision Magazine….I’m so honored. “Infrared photography adores the austere ruggedness of western scenes,” says Sherri Mabe. “The West is my muse.” Never more at home than when she’s wandering the vast Colorado prairie that lies beyond her front door, Mabe creates dreamlike photographs using an infrared (IR) camera, which sees and records light that is beyond the visible spectrum. She finds […]
The TLCA Proudly Presents 2019 MONOCHROME EXHIBITION This past Saturday’s opening reception was fantastic. Show Continues Through November 1st. www.trilakesarts.org * 719-481-0475 Monochrome Photography Show – vision, interpretation and use of monochromatic LIGHT! Special thanks to Cynthia Holling- Morris, our amazing Monochrome judge. Congratulations to these award-winning photographers. Best of Show – Reynalda by Kathie C. Ballah 1st Place Originality – Feeling Small by Sara Hagedorn 2nd Place Originality – Reflections of the Future by Sally […]
A trip to Camp Amache last winter… Camp Amache “The Granada Relocation Center, better known by its postal designation, Amache, is located one mile outside the small town of Granada, in southeastern Colorado. Before the war, Granada was just one of the small farming towns that dotted the valley of the Arkansas River, which runs east a few miles north of the site. The area has a semi-arid climate, with low humidity and average annual rainfall. Summers are hot […]
Monochrome Photography Show – vision, interpretation and use of monochromatic LIGHT Photographers of all levels were invited to submit their original photography for consideration. Black and white photography—Shades of gray and single toned [sepia, selenium, etc] The Monochrome Exhibition is a juried photography exhibit of fine art. The 2019 MONOCHROME Exhibition features 66 outstanding images from the following artists: Kathie C. Ballah, Lea Hope Bonzer, Gene Carlon J. Anthony Crumpton, Dana Gautschi, Wendy Gedack Sara Hagedorn, Marti Harvey, Liz Johnson, […]
Last Mother’s Day most of my family was out of town, so my daughter and I drove out to the prairie in search of the Abbott Church. After 123 miles and a few dirt roads we found this old church sitting quietly upon a hill overlooking the prairie. This has to be one of the most beautiful places on earth. While I was taking photos, a woman arrived with a bouquet of wildflowers to place on one of the few […]
Kolari Vision recently published this feature on my infrared work! As a girl I would linger hours in a fantasy world of faraway galaxies, cloud gazing, enchanted forests, and so on. Growing a bit older I immersed myself in the worlds of books and music, keeping company with words and rhythms. Then at some point in my teens I came upon my father’s old 1960’s Kodak Instamatic camera (I still have it, teeny negatives), and would drive into the […]
The images of farms in my portfolio are a continuation of a series I’m working on here in Colorado. Colorado Farms “This land pulses with life. It breathes in me; it breathes around me; it breathes in spite of me. When I walk on this land, I am walking on the heartbeat of the past and the future. And that’s only one of the reasons I am a farmer.” ― Brenda Sutton Rose The last five months I’ve been documenting […]
MONOCHROME a juried photographic exhibition Opening Reception August 31, 6-8pm Exhibition Runs August 29 to October 29 Photographers of all levels were invited to submit their original photography for consideration. Black and white photography—Shades of gray and single toned [sepia, selenium, etc] The Monochrome Exhibition is a juried photography exhibit of fine art. The mission of Monochrome Photography Show is a challenge to photographers to demonstrate their use of light to help define the subject. The light can be natural […]
I am honored to have the editors at National Geographic’s Top Shot choose my photo for the September 20, 2016 Daily Dozen, and have it go on to win Top Shot, as seen in the Editors’ Spotlight on National Geographic’s website, Instagram’s Your Shot, and Tumblr’s Your Shot. “An August afternoon storm in Colorado Springs along the Front Range of the Rockies. This photo was taken from our deck at sunset, thus the incredible colors,” said Mabe. “The composition was […]
Shiprock is a dramatic 7,177-foot-high rock mountain located in northwestern New Mexico about 20 miles southwest of the town of Shiprock. Geographically speaking, the rock reveals the exposed neck of a long vanished volcano that erupted over 30 million years ago and is easily recognized from a distance for its towering profile. To the Navajo people, Shiprock has greater significance than being known only as a geographical landmark. The Navajo call Shiprock, “Tsé Bitʼa,” meaning Rock with Wings. From a […]
This Native American legend of the Garden of the Gods was compiled a half century ago by Ford C. Frick, and placed on file at the Pioneers Museum, Colorado Springs, Colorado: “In the nestling vales and on the grassy plains which lie at the foot of the Great White Mountain that points the way to heaven lived the Chosen People. Here they dwelt in happiness together. And above them on the summit of the Mighty Peak where stand the Western […]
“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.” ― Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings I snapped this image in 1998 for an advanced photography course I was enrolled in while living in Tampa. One day on a whim while collaborating with friend and fellow photographer, Lori Ballard, this image came to life. We were playing dress up, posing around antiques, drinking champagne, being silly while taking photos in my home. With one […]
