Sunday November 29, 2009

LITCHFIELD, CONNECTICUT – Back to Litchfield to photograph the First Congregational Church at sunrise.  The congregation first met in 1721.  The story of the building is a bit complex.  Here’s a quote from “Historic Buildings of Connecticut”:

“Litchfield’s first meeting house was built on the Green in 1723, the second in 1761 and the third in 1829. In 1873, a fourth church, in the High Victorian Gothic style, was built and the 1829 Federal-style structure, with its steeple removed as was typically done with deconsecrated churches, was moved around the corner. In the coming years it would serve as a community center and theater, known as Amory Hall or Colonial Hall. In the early twentieth century, tastes had shifted back from favoring the Gothic to an interest in the Colonial Revival. In 1929, the Gothic church was demolished and the 1828 church returned to its original site on Torrington Road and restored, complete with a new steeple (1929-30). Reconsecrated, it continues today as the First Congregational Church of Litchfield.”

I’ve taken the liberty of presenting this image in both color and black and white.  The black and white version demonstrates the power of abstraction of this medium.

This images was captured with a Leica M9 digital camera, and a fifty-year old Leitz lens, a 50mm dual range Summicron modified to mount on the M9.  The finished image was stitched together from four overlapping frames, which provides resolution similar to a medium format digital camera or 4×5 film.

The time on the clock on the steeple could either be an hour slow or perpetually 6:30 – it’s actually the latter.