They say a picture is worth a thousand words.
In the case of photographer extraordinaire Russell Autrey, there’s a double treat.
Russell takes the best pictures, and he has a great story to go with each and every one he captures.
I’ve been lucky enough to hear quite a few of those stories over my 20-year history with Russell.
When my family moved to Texas, we settled in Pecan Grove. One afternoon, a neighbor told me my son Nick was pictured on the front page of The Herald-Coaster newspaper.
I went to the newspaper office on Fourth Street, bought a few papers with Nick’s picture on the front and signed up for a subscription.
Over the years, I’d open the paper and see incredible photos of every-day life. Sure enough, the photo credit was attributed to Russell Autrey, and I found myself looking forward to the next day’s paper to see what he’d come up with.
Now people can see a collection of his favorite photos and pen-and-ink drawings in an ongoing exhibit at the George Memorial Library.
Dozens of Russell’s photographs are beautifully and tastefully displayed. The exhibit includes pictures from his early newspaper days, and the black-and-white photos captured life as it was when people lived off the land and their wits.
Many of the photos I remember seeing on the front page of the newspaper, and I smiled as I looked at them, remembering the circumstances surrounding the photo of the little girl holding an icicle and the elderly gentleman kneeling in a wooden church, his eyes closed in silent prayer.
Not only did he catch moments with his camera, he also recreated daily life with a pen and ink.
His attention to detail is astounding, from accurately replicating weathered siding to including the faded graffitti on the side of a building. There’s the added bonus of hearing Russell describe the circumstances around his artwork, thanks to a QR code and the chance to listen to Russell on your phone.
There were no strangers in the gallery – all of us had a connection with Russell, either through family, friendships, our days at The Herald Coaster, now Fort Bend Herald, or a love of photography.
Even though most of us have a few more wrinkles and a lot more gray hair, we were excited to see each other in a happy situation, all thanks to a smiling man at the front of the gallery who was graciously sharing stories about his life behind the lens.
What we didn’t have time to tell him was how positively he’d affected our lives.
Russell’s genuine friendliness, willingness to talk with anyone, his natural ease with children and the elderly, and his gifted story-telling ability are as much gifts as the artist’s eye he’s blessed with.
His stories connect us to what’s really important and that’s the small, every-day moments from stopping to take time to watch the sun rise over Bolivar Peninsula to capturing the pure joy of children frolicking in the rain.
That’s the mark of a true artist – where others walk past something seemingly insignificant, Russell always sees the beauty in the every day, the ordinary and the often overlooked.
If you’re friends with Russell, as thousands are, you are indeed a lucky person. I’m so glad I’m one of those lucky ones.
Make sure and visit the free exhibit at the George Memorial Library, 1001 Golfview in Richmond, through the end of October.
Stop in and make sure you’ve got that QR code downloaded so you can hear the master storyteller describe his view of life through the lens.
This column was originally published in The Fort Bend Herald.