All images by Teresa Golden. Used with permission.
With a fascination for mountain scenery ingrained since childhood, one could say that Colorado-based Teresa Golden was destined to capture the grandeur of the landscape that she shares with some equally stunning wildlife. Having settled in the small mountain community in the Colorado Rockies, the wildlife-rich environment of the Gunnison Valley quickly became her playground and a splendid setting for her to find her footing as a “texture photographer”.
Teresa shared with us that her love of photography began as a young child and was influenced by many family members. “My grandfather showed me ‘mountain scenery’ photography books at the tender age of four years old. My parents gave me a Nikon camera for my sixteenth birthday and my grandmother saw a ‘living spirit’ in my photographs encouraging me to find a venue to share my work.”
Indeed, Gunnison Valley proved perfect for her to capture the “living spirit” that surrounded her. She found home in hiking in the high Rockies, camping in remote places, and observing the vastness of nature. The mountains, she said, are seemingly endless and also filled with birds like Bald Eagles, Blue Heron, and the Osprey. The evenings make way for photogenic, colorful sunsets that paint the vast skies. Big game animals like the Elk roam the valleys, and Bighorn Sheep are seen skipping across the steep mountain peaks.
In the collection of stunning snaps shared with us, Teresa indeed wields inspiration drawn from her “strong spiritual connection to the Sacred Divine” to present the precious living world we exist in. She uses a Nikon D80 DSLR with a 70-300mm lens for her wildlife photography, only doing minimal touch-ups to her photos so we truly see what she sees.
“I consider myself a ‘Texture Photographer’ today. I love to take pictures of landscapes, sunsets and action wildlife but all with an eye for the texture in the scene. A sunset is beautiful. However, when you add a tree, a horse or a mountain panorama, then a regular sunset becomes ‘The Glowing Vista.’ Likewise, a Bald Eagle is pretty and captivating to view on a branch. When I capture the Bald Eagle flying over a flowing river, the bird becomes ‘A Mighty Hunter’, powerful and compelling to watch swooping a fish from the waters.”
