+13 Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Photographer Clyde Butcher • A Man for All Seasons
Clyde Butcher is a photographer who has been compared to the great Ansel Adams, an author of an impressive number of books and a fervent defender of planet Earth. He has traveled the world, documenting his wanderlust with his camera. His overriding concern is for the health and well-being of our world and its ecosystems. He puts his money where his mouth is, living and preaching his beliefs, his concern for the Earth and all its inhabitants.
Butcher, who is 78 and suffered a debilitating stroke three years ago, grew up in the Midwest, attended college and lived for a time on the west coast, and eventually settled in Florida. He graduated from California Polytechnic University in the field of architecture but found himself increasingly drawn to photography. After seeing an Ansel Adams exhibit at Yosemite National Park, Butcher left architecture behind. He embraced photography wholeheartedly, first selling his work at festivals and later building a successful commercial art photography company.
The business’s success was also a source of stress for Butcher and his wife Niki Vogel, and in 1977, he sold the company and built a sailboat. Living on a sailboat and taking pictures started Butcher down a path that led him down a circuitous path to the Everglades. It was here that his eyes were opened to the savage beauty and the delicate fragility of our world. Today, his passion informs his art and vice versa. He has become an educator, an advocate, and an ambassador for the balance of nature upon which our survival depends.
Butcher’s photography has evolved along with his career. Over the years, he progressed from color photography with a conventional film camera to an 8×10 large format camera, shooting black and white, and now, due to his stroke, he is using a digital camera. “I used film forever,” he says. “I’ve only recently moved on to digital for a number of reasons – it has gotten better and better, and I need so much less in the way of equipment.”
Even since his stroke, Butcher ventures into the Everglades and Big Cypress with the assistance of a walker so he can document both the beauty and the threats to his beloved south Florida home. “There’s just so much to see,” he says. “I’ll never be able to photograph everything.” He has even had the honor of giving former President Jimmy Carter and members of his family a personal swamp walk. Clyde now lives in Venice, Florida, to be near his daughter, Jackie, who runs the business, and his son-in-law, who is his darkroom assistant. His home is carbon negative, producing more energy than it consumes. “Our home is powered by solar panels with back-up batteries. It not only powers our house, but also powers our electric car,” he explains. “Our cottage in Big Cypress is entirely fueled by 11,000 watts of solar energy and three Tesla batteries.”
Clyde Butcher spreads the message of the Everglades’ unique beauty through his art, books, and private tours of his beloved swamp. In addition, he owns two exclusive, private nature retreats located on thirteen acres of Big Cypress Swamp, surrounded by a million acres of wilderness. These cottages allow the visitor to combine pristine natural surroundings with modern amenities. “To know the swamp, you have to get into the swamp,” says Butcher.
Butcher’s work is exhibited and sold in his gallery and studio in Venice, Florida, and the Big Cypress Gallery in Ochopee, Florida. A major showing of his work, the American Everglades Exhibit, opens April 15 at the Naples Botanical Garden. This expansive wilderness collection captures the many years Butcher spent exploring the Everglades and documenting its changes. The body of work has been praised by many, notably filmmaker Ken Burns, who has stated, “Clyde Butcher’s remarkable photographs give us access to nature we rarely see or experience. . . . Butcher’s art is a national treasure.”
Books by Clyde Butcher cover more than the Everglades. He has photographed the natural beauty of Cuba and Dali’s Spain, written and photographed America’s National Parks as well as our country’s natural beauty from coast to coast. His current project is a comprehensive lookbook of images taken in Florida, his adopted and beloved home. “This book will present Florida from coast to coast to coast,” he says. “From the Dry Tortugas up the east coast to Jacksonville and Big and Little Talbot Island, to Apalachicola and the Panhandle, then down the other side along the Gulf of Mexico.”
Information about Butcher, his body of work, galleries, and calendar of events and appearances can be found on his website at www.clydebutcher.com.
