Love Affair with the Hudson River on Display

 By Tom Pedulla—

A man’s 50-year love affair with the Hudson River is detailed in a new exhibit at the Hudson River Museum in Yonkers.

“Lens on the Hudson: Photographs by Joseph Squillante” will run until Oct. 19. Visitors are sure to appreciate the natural beauty of the 315-mile body of water but also to understand the significant damage done over time and efforts to undo that.

Laura Vookles, chair of the Hudson River Museum’s Curatorial Department, believes Squillante provides insight that perhaps no one else can offer.

“Through his work, he came to know many people important to the fight to protect the Hudson River, and those connections provided him with unique access,” Vookles said. “No other photojournalist or artistic photographer has assembled such a significant body of Hudson River images.”

Squillante, 75, found himself drawn to the Hudson in 1975. He was helping a childhood friend renovate a newly-purchased house in Tivoli that overlooked the water.

“I recognized very quickly that this was a powerful subject,” he said. “I remember developing the prints in a darkroom in a tray and the images coming up were really very powerful images, awesome images. I knew there was something special here.”

He also knew he had found his purpose after graduating from Iona and quickly realizing the banking industry was not for him. “Fifty weeks for the bank, two weeks for Joe. It did not compute,” he said.

He first picked up a camera in earnest when a friend hired him to photograph his wedding. As he backed up the aisle clicking away at the smiling bride, he knew the job satisfaction far exceeded anything he had done before. Then the Hudson entered his life.

“Photography makes us stop for a moment to take a closer look,” he said. “That’s what it did for me personally.”

The 30-photo “Lens on the Hudson” offers a captivating mix of romantic landscapes, portraiture, still life and abstraction. It is supported in part by Nicholas and Shelley Robinson. Westchester County also provides assistance.

Squillante will make a presentation about his work on June 21 at 2 p.m. at the museum. He calls the camera his “magic box,” but anyone viewing the exhibit recognizes the keen eye behind the lens and the artist who makes the magic happen.

Squillante has seemingly captured every angle and aspect of the river from its source at Lake Tear of the Clouds in the Adirondacks to its mouth in New York City. He has been aboard the sloop Clearwater as it undertakes its mission of protecting the Hudson and safeguarding the drinking water it provides. He crept up close as caretakers banded eagles and monitored them, leading to a resurgence of the species in the mid-Hudson Valley.

For reasons he strains to explain, no subject captivates him the way the Hudson River does. There is no turning away from it.

“I can’t put it down,” he said. “Sometimes these things are bigger than we are. You don’t know why. The thing is to go with it and not just put it aside.”

It helps that he is often accompanied on his ventures by his wife, Carol Capobianco. She cheerfully notes that she has been “traveling the Hudson with Joe for 36 of the 50 years.”

While they are pleased they no longer see debris floating in the water, Squillante said of challenging clean-up efforts, “It’s an ongoing process. It’s never going to end.”

As for the tireless photographer, he is convinced he has found his reason for being.

“It’s my mission in life. It’s why I’m here. I thank God I know that and I embraced it,” Squillante said, adding that he could use another lifetime or two to properly cover the subject that fascinates him so.

 

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