This is a small selection of photographs taken at Harvey Fite's sculpture park Opus 40. Fite (1903 - 1976) was one of the co-founders of Bard College's Fine Arts Department. He purchased a decommissioned bluestone quarry between Saugerties and Woodstock in 1938, and projected to labor in it for exactly 40 years. An accident shortened this projection by 3 years. What he created over 37 years of toiling, tunneling, excavation and accummulation constitutes a "labyrinthine world of finely fitted stone, swirling stone ramps and terraces constructed around pools and trees and fountains, rising out of bedrock a half mile deep."
Fite's world was opened to the public in 1978. It includes the sculpture park, the Fite's private residence, and a (very interesting) Quarryman's Museum. It was designated the status of a National Historic Site, too.
Visited September 28, 2012, and again May 17, 2014. Cameras used: Fuji S5, Leica M9 and Samsung EX1. Files variously processed in LR4/5, PS5, and SFX2.
Thomas H. Hahn
Ithaca, NY
* Quoted from the official Opus 40 website at
www.opus40.org
