A local eighth grader will exhibit her photography at Diesel, A Bookstore, beginning Sunday.
By Susan Bunn / Special to The Malibu Times
Ever since she was a little girl, when she first grabbed the family camera out of her dad’s hands, Charlotte Lansbury, 14, has taken pictures.
“At a beach in San Luis Obispo when she was six or seven, I was taking pictures of the landscape-large rock formations, the ocean-capturing the magnificence of the place,” her father, Mike Lansbury, said.
“Charlotte commandeered the camera and immediately focused on a different world: patterns in the windblown sand, tiny shellfish, the movement of water over a single rock,” her father added. “That’s indicative of her instinct, and her gift.”
“I love to photograph simple, everyday elements of nature from unique angles to make them look interesting and beautiful,” Charlotte said. “I think that the magic of photography is the fact that you can make anything on earth look completely new and different.”
Charlotte, who is an eighth grader at Viewpoint School in Calabasas, will display her work at Diesel, A Bookstore, beginning Sunday. This will be her first exhibit.
It is Charlotte’s mom, Janet Lansbury, who may be given credit for the deliberate nature of helping Charlotte find her own way of beholding and creating.
“As Charlotte grew I tried to stay out of her way in any of her early artistic endeavors,” Janet said. “When she was given her first box of crayons at age 18 months or so, I was determined to try not to show her how to use them,” she explained, referring to a program called RIE, where she learned to let her children make their own discoveries.
“She was fascinated by taking the crayons out of the box and putting them back in…again and again and again!”
It was difficult for Janet to have a hands-off approach, especially for the weeks endured in the experiment. As it turned out, she said the value of Charlotte’s development of her own discerning ability was worth the wait.
“When she finally drew with crayons she drew her way with confidence,” Janet said. “Whatever she did creatively was the ‘right’ way since she had no one to imitate.”
In her photos-from items going down the drain, to flowers blossoming in specially effected color and textures-things jumps out at the beholder, making an instant connection. Color, above all else, is what makes a picture perfect, she said.
“Many of my photos have very bright, vibrant colors because in general, I am a happy person, and vivid colors cheer me up and are very pleasing to me,” she said. “I believe that life and photography are all about color.”
“My favorite subject to photograph is actually people,” Charlotte added. “I love capturing emotion and beauty in my friends and family.”
“It’s a pleasure to be struck by the beauty and intelligence, heart and head of an artist through their work, all the more so when they are young and just getting to it,” Diesel bookstore owner John Evans, said. “The freshness, thoughtfulness, playfulness, and just plain joy are clearly evident and we hope everyone comes to celebrate this talent deliberately developing.”
Charlotte has a younger sister and brother, Madeline and Ben, and in addition to photography she also enjoys soccer, basketball, volleyball, dance, acting, filmmaking, assisting at St. Aidan’s Church Sunday School, sleep and communicating with her 263 close personal friends on MySpace, according to a biography released by Diesel.
Charlotte’s work will be displayed at Diesel, A Bookstore beginning Nov. 19, 3 p.m., with an opening party.