November 7,
2002
Ostapeck to present
picture of her work
By Kelly Bruni
Staff Writer
CoopersTown
Crier ©2000-2003
Fly Creek photographer
Lady Ostapeck remembers when she first became interested in photography.
She was 2-years-old, lying in her crib, when her uncle was trying
to get her to look at him. But her eyes were so mesmerized by a photograph
on the wall, she would not look at him.
“And I’ve
been looking at pictures ever since,”said Ostapeck.
Area residents
will have an opportunity to hear Ostapeck talk about her “portraits
of fantasy” at the next Friends of Library series held on Nov.
14 at 7:30 p.m. in the village meeting room below the library.
“We are very
excited to have her as a quest speaker. She is a community treasure,”
said Stephanie Bauer, Friends of the Library board member and program
chairperson. “People should be aware of her work.”
Ostapeck’s
studio is the creative home to portraits where local residents dress
up as if from another time period. She could take straight forward
photos like many other photographers do, but Ostapeck prefers doing
it her own unique way, she said.
Ostapeck gets
to know her subjects by asking what their first memory was as a child,
what nationality they are and what time period they wish they could
live in. The conversation helps with the design and setting of the
portrait, said Ostapeck. “Some people know what they want to
be, and some don’t.”
Ostapeck enjoys
creating portraits of people in the attire of the 1920s. A few people
have chosen to be from the 1930s, including an excellent Jean Harlow
look-alike, said Ostapeck.
Ostapeck doesn’t
have any schooling as a photographer. “I make sure I don’t
learn a lot about photography. I do work intuitively. We all have
[intuition], but we reject it,” she said.
In a recent tour
of Ostapeck’s studio, Ostapeck offered advice to a group of photographers.
“If you haven’t much money, don’t just sit there. You
must depend on your intuition. Everything I use is second hand. Even
my camera is 100 years old with a broken shutter.“ She found
the 4 x 5 studio view camera at the Salvation Army.
The Friends of
the Library consider it an honor for Ostapeck to be speaking, said
Bauer. Her work has been exhibited in galleries across the country
and in Finland, Ireland, and with the Royal Photographic Society of
Great Britain. For her show in Ireland, she said she brought a collection
of pictures of anyone with Irish descent from this area.
She has also been
featured in professional photography magazines such as Rangefinder,
Modern Photography, and Popular Photography.
Ostapeck was born
in Brooklyn, NY As an adult, Ostapeck worked as a negative retoucher.
She said it’s the secret of her photography now. Sometimes light
may throw unwanted shadows on faces, so Ostapeck uses her past work
experience to remedy the problem.
Ostapeck became
tired of the stress and strain of New York and had always dreamed
of living in the country. She placed an ad in the Rural New Yorker
for: Lady with a horse wants country place. She received over 120
responses. One response was from Fly Creek, where she now lives.
”Beware what
you fantasize, it comes true,” she said.
