TITLE: Shelfies: Turkey Tails

As a photographer I become more and more fascinated with the wild variety of mushrooms which are the wildflowers of the woods or the mushrooms in our midst. In fact, this series of Turkey Tails shows such variety in shadings and rings, the monochrome versions shown here are individual in their appearance. In fact, just as the tree's rings within its wood shows the age of the tree, so the rings of this particular shelf mushroom show age. You want them on your deadwood to break down the debris of the woods, and, more recently, Turkey Tails or shelf mushrooms are helping treat patients undergoing chemotherapy for cancer. They are quite common as a variety, but within that variety the shadings and how they array themselves, as shown in these images, for a stylish appearance are very individualistic.

AUTHOR: Y. Hope Osborn (United States)

Y. Hope Osborn is an author, photographer, digital artist, and editor residing in Little Rock, Arkansas, USA. Her published writing includes ecological experiences that educate and entertain and personal traumas that encourage survivors and expose victimization. She relies on God’s strength to photographically document space and time of natural color environment; historic often dilapidated black and white studies of built; and more recently, where they intersect. Her absolute art is the fusion of photographs and texts of history and her story, weaving art with how she/we think, feel, believe, connect, and care.

Hope has an MA in Professional and Technical Writing and is published as author and artist with Woods Reader, Plants and Poetry Journal, Whitefish Review, University of Arkansas at Little Rock Writers’ Network, Awakenings, The Sunlight Press, and online Encyclopedia of Arkansas. Her works are exhibited and awarded, including Monovisions Awards, Neutral Density, Julia Margaret Cameron Photography Award, International Photography Awards, Architecture Masterprize, See|Me, internationally, online, and off in Portland, Oregon; New York City; Santa Paula, California, Arkansas—USA and Barcelona, Spain. She won Not Real Art Artist Award and $10,000 Mid-America Arts Alliance Catalyze grants.

Hope believes being a great author and artist is to be entrusted to express reality and imagination that captivates, inspires, or informs while enriching lives.