Face To Face With Nature – A Unique Photo Exhibit In Niagara, Ontario

By Daniel K. Wilson

(A Brief Foreword from Niagara At Large Doug Draper – I first met Dan Wilson close to two decades ago while still covering environmental issues for the late, great, independent St. Catharines Standard.

Dan was one of the earlier individuals in this Niagara, Ontario region who worked to raise awareness about the wrongness of imprisoning magnificent ocean mammals like orca whales and dolphins in cement tanks in amusement parks like Marineland in Niagara Falls. For his efforts he was later sued by Marineland – a lawsuit that was later dropped, but not before Canadian scientist and CBC Nature of Things host David Suzuki spoke her to raise funds for Dan’s defense.

 What is also true of Dan, and what I learned much later, is that he is also a very talented nature photographer and Niagara At Large has been fortunate to feature some of his photos here during the first couple of years this site has been doing its best to offer something new and independent in this region of the world.

This October you can enjoy some of Dan’s fine photography on display at the Pelham Public Library, located at 43 Pelham Square in the town of Fonthill. For further information on the library and its location and hours click on www.pelhamlibrary.on.ca/ .

 Now I leave it to Dan to discuss this exhibit of his work in his words.)

Dan calls this photo ‘Angry Bull Tree’. 

I see faces everywhere; always have. When I was a little kid I did what other little kids did: I looked up in the sky searching for faces and animals hiding in the clouds. But being a creative and somewhat obsessive little guy I didn’t stop there. I would look for faces in floor tiles, on trees or floating around in my cereal bowl.

And I still do. I can spend hours at Little Cove near Tobermory scouring the beach in search of boulders that seem to be staring back up at me, or carefully inspecting every frozen puddle I come across in Short Hill Provincial Park hoping to find something that catches my eye.

There’s a term for this affliction: pareidolia (pronounced parr-i-DOH-lee-a). It’s a misperception involving a vague or random stimulus (often an image or sound) being perceived as something distinct. Sometimes it’s auditory, like thinking you’re hearing the phone ring when you’re taking a shower, even though it’s not. But visually, it could be seeing a face in an electrical outlet, spotting a dragon in a soufflé of clouds or glimpsing Elvis in a cinnamon bun.

Dan calls this photograph, taken in Watertown, Ontario, ‘Ghosticle.

Some psychologists use pareidolia to try and understand our mental states. Both the Rorschach Inkblot Test and Holtzman Inkblot Technique encourage this phenomenon to examine personality characteristics and emotional functioning.

Carl Sagan thought we were all hardwired to identify the human face for survival, allowing us to use only minimal details to recognize people in places with limited visibility. Others believe humans have just learned to be very careful about potential predators, with the brain simply overreacting to something that looks like a possible threat in order to survive.

Whether it’s an evolutionary trait or not, I certainly have a lot of fun with it. And I’ve been able to record a number of “faces” during my hikes, weekend jaunts and camping trips, which I am pleased to be able to share with you.

Some of them are pretty easy to spot while others may be a bit more challenging to see at first. The titles might help you see what I see if you’re a little stumped. Good luck, and I hope you have as much fun finding them as I did.

Daniel K. Wilson is a nature and wildlife photographer whose photos have appeared in a number of Canadian publications. He currently resides in St. David’s. You can find out more by visiting his website at   danielkwilsonphotography.blogspot.ca . 

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