Iceland, midwinter, midday light
Editor’s Letter Finding the Light in Darkness . . .
On a trip to Iceland, in
2018, I gained a new appreciation for daylight, which barely makes an appearance during the dead of winter there. Nonetheless, the low angle of the light, which filters through thin clouds, produces dramatic effects, especially in its relationship to darkness. Our guide took us across two icy streams to a cave with walls coated in clear ice. The contrast of the flat light filtering in through the open roof of the cave glistened off the ice-covered walls, partnering with the grayed darkness to create a sense that we were inside God’s cathedral, lit with His heavenly light. Light’s relationship to darkness has been a subject of wonder since the beginnings of human interaction with our environment. In this issue, Kasia Staniaszek makes it the subject of a personal journey to find the light
in darkness. Since light and darkness are ever-present everywhere, she needed travel no further than her immediate surroundings to witness its effects, the messages conveyed and the elements of interactions that themselves are ever-present, but invariably overlooked. Once, deep in an underground cave in the Appalachians, our guides turned off all the lanterns and we couldn’t make out any part of our hands in front of our faces. It was terrifying. We need to know there is some component of light in the darkness we experience on a daily basis and that is what Kasia set out to uncover. What is revealed is a discovery of the extraordinary in the ordinary.
-- Tony Tedeschi
