Chesapeake Oystermen

This coffee table photobook depicts oystermen harvesting oysters in adverse, cold conditions in the Chesapeake Bay tributary, Patuxent River, offshore from Solomons Island, Maryland. The book includes historical descriptions of the area, information about the biological lineage of the local oyster, and 10 historical recipes from the oystermen's families.

This book is a photojournalistic adventure of the adverse, icy conditions that the oysterman must endure in the Chesapeake Bay's winter harvest season. The photos also show the various equipment, boats, and methods used to collect oysters. The book includes historical descriptions of the area, information about the biological lineage of the local oyster, and 10 historical recipes from the oystermen's families. Photos are accompanied by details about the conditions that the photographer faced and the effects the cold had upon his equipment each day.

Garvin Smith grew up exposed to the Art culture and museums in Washington DC and Baltimore, Md. At the early age of four he started drawing, by the age of seven did his first oil painting studies. His Father started teaching him the camera basics at the age of nine and he did his first commercial job at the age of fourteen. His art and photography style today are heavily influenced by his studies at the George Washington University's Corcoran College of Art & Design and the Washington Color school artists. Today he still uses film and this old school mindset and discipline when creating his black and white digital works. As an Artist, the camera is one of the tools that he uses to capture nature's creations. Nature provides many types of beauty…. landscape and the human form. We just have to create the framework that directs the viewer to the main point of interest. As an artist he uses his camera or brush to capture his subject and light as his medium to define and accent the beauty which creates the illusion of mystery and evokes emotional responses within us.