Ines Labunski Roberts

Artist Statement

Our daily lives are a bombardment of photographs and reports about human conditions. Stories of slaughter, crime, poverty, and injustices are forced on us. We have such an excess of it, that it can have the effect of numbing our senses. – Some people will withdraw from so much pain into a state of utter helpless hopelessness or opt for passive fatalism.
I am so aware of all that misery. But in my photographs I refuse to speak of it, because I would feel, as if I am only adding to that plethora of pain.

Yes, this misery is a bitter reality of our existence, but there is also the other reality of hope and beauty. Our human spirit will always reach for that and be nourished by it.

In a ridiculously small gesture I wish to share this with people, if only for a short glance, for a moment. Because the beauty around us is a reality, it is not my dream, a mere romantic fantasy. It belongs to all of us; it is our greatest, and our true universal heritage.
I am so aware of all that misery. But in my photographs I refuse to speak of it, because I would feel, as if I am only adding to that plethora of pain. Yes, this misery is a bitter reality of our existence, but there is also the other reality of hope and beauty. Our human spirit will always reach for that and be nourished by it. In a ridiculously small gesture I wish to share this with people, if only for a short glance, for a moment. Because the beauty around us is a reality, it is not my dream, a mere romantic fantasy. It belongs to all of us; it is our greatest, and our true universal heritage. I am so aware of all that misery. But in my photographs I refuse to speak of it, because I would feel, as if I am only adding to that plethora of pain. Yes, this misery is a bitter reality of our existence, but there is also the other reality of hope and beauty. Our human spirit will always reach for that and be nourished by it. In a ridiculously small gesture I wish to share this with people, if only for a short glance, for a moment. Because the beauty around us is a reality, it is not my dream, a mere romantic fantasy. It belongs to all of us; it is our greatest, and our true universal heritage.

Resume

Ines Roberts has lived with her family in Santa Barbara since 1966. She was born in Danzig – now Poland, and was educated in Germany and England.- British and American Nationality.
She is a self-taught photographer and has produced over 35 slide-music programs since 1972 when her first show ”The Four Seasons of Sequoia” received a standing ovation at the PSA International Convention of Photography in San Francisco. All slide-shows have been premiered at the SB Museum of Art.
Her photographs have been published as feature articles in London (Royal Photography Society of Britain), Mexico, Canada, Holland, Germany and Japan ( The Minolta Mirror) and the USA
Her articles and photographs are published regularly in the prestigious German Nature Magazine “Natur Foto” and “Terra”; and Nature Photographer( USA). Her Cibachrome Prints have been exhibited in many one-woman-shows both here and abroad.
In 1987 and 1994 she was a 1st Prize winner in the Sierra Annual Contest.
She won a Bronze and Silver Medal in the International Print Exhibition of the Royal Photographic Society. In 2003 was awarded “ Juror’s Choice” in the International Slide competition of the RPS .
Overall Winner in the Royal Aero Club.
2003 BBC Wildlife Photographer of the Year in Wildplaces
In 1988 Ines Roberts was elected a Nominee for the Californian Art Advocate.
In 1992 she gained the Fellowship of the R.P.S. of Great Britain after submission of 20 prints.
In 1996 The London Salon of Photography invited her to be a Member. (They have only 35 members worldwide)
She has given workshops and lectures at the UCSB and other places in the USA