Showcasing her work publicly for the first time, Homer photographer Katie Martin’s landscape images share her passion for time spent in nature. Her debut exhibit is on display through March at Grace Ridge Brewing.
While Martin has been taking photographs for the past 15 years, a hobby since in her early 20s, she has previously only shown what she shoots to family and friends and via social media. In this untitled exhibit that introduces to the community her love for capturing landscapes, Martin shares 13 images that include flowers, mountains, fish, beaches, glaciers, rivers and lakes.
Martin shot “Peyto Lake” last fall while she and a friend spent a week and a half exploring two of Alberta’s National Parks, Banff and Jasper, including traveling the Icefield Parkway.
“There were so many gorgeous canyons and lakes,” Martin said. “We hiked a little trail to a viewpoint overlooking Peyto Lake and I was taken by how beautiful it was — the oblong, bright blue glacial lake with the gorgeous mountain behind it with its different color striations, the blue sky against the white clouds and the trees around the edge of the lake.”
“Steelhead on the Anchor” depicts a steelhead salmon being held just out of the water. “Canoe on Lake Louise” was shot from the perspective of sitting within the canoe facing an enclave between two mountains with the blue sky, clouds and mountains reflected in the river. “Starfish on Saddle Trail Beach” shows a grouping of starfish on the pebbled beach near the Saddle Trail in Kachemak Bay State Park, with the bay and mountains in the distance.
An opportunistic photographer, Martin carries a camera, either her Canon Rebel or her iPhone, with her everywhere she goes, including on her regular outdoor adventures hiking, snowmachining and skiing local trails, kayaking the bay, and fly fishing the Anchor River, Kachemak Bay and, one time, the remote Alaskan community of Yakutat.
A former shift nurse and assistant director at South Peninsula Hospital’s Long Term Care, Martin is currently the director, a job that she shared is both stressful and satisfying, and which allows her to pursue time in nature and to nurture her creativity. In addition to photography, she paints with acrylic and alcohol ink and makes jewelry and ornaments. She recently started felting and taking pottery classes.
“I’ve always liked using both sides of my brain and my creativity is a great outlet and helps me relax,” she said.
Martin moved to Homer from Wisconsin in spring 2013 after she and a friend came up together the year prior to join Martin’s father, brother and a family friend on a fishing trip.
“We flew into Anchorage and then drove down to Homer for a two-day halibut fishing charter,” she said. “I was only in Homer for 48 hours, but I met so many people and fell in love with the community and the beauty and knew I was smitten.”
Six months later, before making the commitment to move, Martin and her friend returned to Homer in the winter to see what it would be like.
“We were like, ‘oh yeah, we can do this’,” she said. “I mean, we’re from the Midwest.”
And the friends made the move north together.
While Martin enjoyed landscape photography in Wisconsin, she said she finds the diversity and ruggedness of Alaska’s landscapes even more inspiring.
“In Wisconsin, everything is beautiful, but flat, mild and tame,” she said. “Here, you have the ocean, rivers, mountains and glaciers and everywhere you look there’s so much wild beauty. I’m constantly stopping whatever I’m doing outside to take photographs. Moving to Alaska has expanded my creative brain even more.”
Martin loves to travel and the photographs in her exhibit include those from both Alberta and Alaska, including the Alberta communities of Banff, Bow River and Lake Louise and in Alaska, Anchor River, Denali Highway, Homer, Kachemak Bay State Park and the Matanuska valley.
Her image, “Matanuska Glacier Iceberg,” was shot during a weeklong trip she and a friend took exploring Talkeetna, Denali and the Matanuska area.
“We went on a Matanuska Glacier Tour where you can hike on the glacier,” she said. “This photograph is from one of the viewpoints where we stopped. I thought it was just breathtaking with the little lake where the glacier was melting and the reflection of the glacier in the water. It was just a perfect, nice and sunny day.”
When choosing images for this exhibit, Martin sorted through photographs she had shot within the last couple of years, choosing to showcase a variety of her landscape work.
“I have both the opportunity and the motivation to get out and see the beauty around us and so it’s very rewarding to share this with those who may not have the same opportunity or motivation,” she said.
A self-taught photographer, Martin has been inspired by the positive response to her exhibit during the First Friday opening. As she has the time and energy, she would like to continue showing her photography, seeking out galleries and other art spaces.
“I have a great career that stimulates the opposite part of my brain and I’m delighted that people are enjoying my work, but I don’t want to put pressure on myself to keep doing art shows,” she said. “I’ll always be out there taking photographs and making things that are beautiful because these activities bring me a lot of joy. We’ll see what happens in the future.”
In the meantime, Martin is inspired by viewing other photographers’ work and is experimenting shooting at different angles and from different perspectives.
“I get to live in such a beautiful place and I naturally want to capture where I live and what I see every single day,” she said.
View Martin’s photographs at Grace Ridge Brewing through March and on social media, Katie Martin on Facebook and Katie_Goes_Fishing on Instagram.
“Peyto Lake,” a photograph taken in Alberta, Canada by Katie Martin in the fall of 2023, is on display in her solo exhibit at Grace Ridge Brewing this month. Photo provided by Katie Martin
“Matanuska Glacier Iceberg,” a photograph taken by Katie Martin in August 2021 at Matanuska Glacier, is one of 13 images on display in her solo exhibit at Grace Ridge Brewing in March. Photo provided by Katie Martin
“River,” a photograph by Katie Martin, is taken in Alberta, Canada in the fall of 2023. Photo provided by Katie Martin
