Because Connie Imboden shoots from under the water in a lit, black bottom swimming pool, the images that the lens sees and and the film captures are like nothing we are used to observing. Similar occular distortions appear in her mirror photographs. Curious doublings, splittings, reflections, make Imboden's final images look eerie and unworldly. Beautiful and grotesque, compelling and repelling at one time. Because we are not used to looking from the underwater or shattered glass perspectives, much less with lights and the capabilities of lens and film, it is hard to decipher the images. The familiar and the strange overlap.

Like The Night Mare and The White Mare, Imboden's photographs call forth deep terror and life affirming beauty. It all depends on what the viewer sees. And that, for me, is the most remarkable thing about Imboden's work.

I first saw Connie's work as a slide show and lecture she presented to an audience of photographers and photography students at The Maine Photographic Workshop. While I and some others were literally gasping in delight and amazement at the power and energy of the photographs, I noticed that some people around me seemed upset or frightened. The images had called forth powerful reactions from all the viewers. Everyone was talking animatedly as we left the lecture.

The models of Imboden's photographs are people posing in a pool. By themselves, they are doing nothing extraordinary. And yet. because of Imboden's vision and technique the images become something else. Something powerful indeed.They become a vehicle for the viewers own emotions.

Connie on her work:
"These images are seen through the camera, they are not manipulated in the darkroom or computer. I am often amazed at the shapes and forms that have appeared in my work. My intention has always been to explore the body, not to alter it. I want to find the camera angle from which the forms can be the most that they can be - whatever that is. If it is a grace to the limbs, then I want the angle from which that grace becomes the absolute most it can be at that moment. And so it leads me on, to explore angles, space, reflections and light. I strive to make forms make sense visually and trust that the metaphor, the poetry will follow."

Connie Imboden's books include Beauty Of Darkness, published by Custom & Limited Editions, which won the Silver Medal in Switzerland's "Schonste Bucher AusAll Welt" (Most Beautiful Book in The World) award in 1993. Her other books include The Raw Seduction of Flesh, published by Silver Arts as well as catalogues from her solo shows in Venezuela and France. Her work has been featured in Aperture, Camera and Darkroom, FotoPractica, Photographies, Photo Review, Vis A Vis and Zoom Magazine.