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Digital Exclusives | Summer 2020

The camera sees what we can’t

Photography by Andrew Shurtleff

Charlottesville photographer Andrew Shurtleff in late March made these dramatic photographs of Grounds under quarantine using infrared technology, which captures wavelengths of light outside the spectrum of what the human eye can see. The result is a high-contrast image with a nearly dreamlike look.

The Rotunda waits out the spring quarantine—no dogs, no Frisbees, no classes.
Straight lines and infrared photography create a stark scene in the garden behind Pavilion V.
If a flower blooms in the garden behind Pavilion V, but there’s nobody there to see it …?
A Serpentine Wall snakes around the garden of Pavilion X.
A spring day, but no basketball, at John Paul Jones
The long shadows of Lambeth colonnade.
An infrared filter electrifies the blossoming trees.
An abandoned Grounds emboldens a hungry fox.

Jefferson surveys the quiet of the Darden School quadrangle.

Mad Bowl, as seen through an appropriately surreal sculpture in front of the Fralin Museum of Art.
Runk Dining Room, nestled among the trees near Observatory Hill.
The Academical Village on a pandemical day in March.
A ray of hope breaks through the portico of Pavilion IX.

Lambeth arch stands amid the foliage of the Dell.

A single person crosses the Lawn on what might have otherwise been a bustling day.