Frederica Matera
The Ambiguous Forest
In Maine there is a certain coastal rainforest which simultaneously attracts and alarms me. Despite biting insects, slithery creatures, startling creaks, cracks and groans, I have been drawn there over decades.
A soggy and often hazardous walk into the forest of gnarled and majestic trees, reveals plush mossy patches, tiny lichen gardens and startling evidence of nature’s violent, destruction and insistent decay.
I photograph the forest to share and reveal it since few will enter there with me.
Artist Bio
With a Brownie Hawkeye camera, Frederica Matera documented her childhood in East Boston. Later, a Minox spy camera accompanied her to college. After a pause for marriage and launching two daughters, she picked up her cameras again and attended the New England School of Photography. On graduation she started a studio and general photographic business, but eventually narrowed her focus to editorial photography – working with authors as both illustrator and photo editor of books and magazine articles.
Now retired, Frederica continues to photograph what compels her interest: the catch-in-your-throat moments of nature, macro or distant, local or foreign; the significance of historic landscapes and architecture; and always, the marvelous audacity of children.
She has had solo exhibitions at The Boston Architectural Center, The Newport Historical Society, and State Street Bank Headquarters and has participated in many group shows. Her images have been published in books (notably Preserving New England, and Dangerous Animals of North America); newspapers (including The New York Times, Boston Globe, Christian Science Monitor); and magazines (Orion, Preservation Magazine) and more.
Contact Frederica Matera