A young Narrogin photographer will showcase his most prized prints at his first-ever exhibition after a year-long mentorship with his idol.
Casey Jacobs’ exhibition, titled Narrogin and the South West, comprises 37 landscape images and will debut at Arts Narrogin on December 6 at 6pm.
The 18-year-old’s work captures landscapes from Narrogin to Dunsborough, including farmland, salt lakes, beaches, forests, mine sites and marinas, with a mixture of man-made and natural focuses.
The exhibition caps off Jacobs’ 12-month Arts Narrogin EnRich Scholarship mentorship with award-winning landscape photographer Christian Fletcher.
Jacobs said the mentorship turned his wildest dreams into a reality, given that it was a visit to the Christian Fletcher Gallery that ignited his love of photography four years ago.
Fletcher is a South West photographer who has won multiple awards for his work, including Australian Professional Landscape Photographer of the Year at the Australian Institute of Professional Photography in 2011.
His young protege said he felt honoured to be mentored by Fletcher, with his favourite part being the friendship they built and how generous Fletcher was with his time and knowledge.
Every exhibited photograph was taken on a DJI Air 3S drone, which Fletcher recommended to Jacobs because it has a 50mp resolution, instead of his Sony A6400 camera with 24mp.
Jacobs said Fletcher taught him how to compose photographs using his new drone and explained how he edits his images in post-production, which Jacobs applied to his own style.
Having graduated from WA College of Agriculture Narrogin in October, Jacobs said he hopes to combine his two interests — photography and farming — by focusing on rural and agricultural imagery.
“There’s amazing things that you can find on farms. I’ve taken photos of Taarblin Lake that’s on a farm east of Narrogin. That was amazing,” he said.
“It was a massive salt lake with heaps of dead trees — liquid from the farm went into the lake because there was a pipe that went out there and dispersed all this multi-coloured liquid, it was red, blue, purple, pink and yellow.
“I went out there and took photos of it and that was actually my first exhibition-worthy photo.”
Jacobs said he is thrilled to have his work exhibited.
“I’m very grateful to Christian and Arts Narrogin for this amazing opportunity to display my photography work for everyone to have a look at,” he said.
“It’s pretty special.”
Exhibition dates are December 9-20 and January 13-31. Arts Narrogin gallery hours are Tuesday-Thursday 10am-4pm, and Saturday 10am-2pm.
