Artist: Beth Dow

These recent photographs were taken in formal English and Italian gardens. The shape and mystery of these places are a natural draw for me as they offer glimpses of the rich traditions of garden making. I am interested in garden history and historical concepts of paradise, and aim for pictures that have a meditative quality to reflect the spiritual urges that inspired the earliest gardens some six thousand years ago. My images are not depictive. I use the land before me as a jumping off point, implying light or shadow where perhaps there was none, as a way to create my own path through the garden. In fact, by positioning the lens, cropping my prints, and using burning and dodging to guide the viewer's eye through a picture, I feel that I too am a gardener in a sense. I am after that "slant of curious light" that is the genius of a place

photographs & quote via bethdow.com

I like Beth Dow's work, because when looking through her book, you are not confronted with the presence of other people. The uniform style (including format of the images) keeps you in this fantasy world until you reach the back cover.
Aesthetically, Dow is great at composing frames that have a clear symmetry/vanishing points.
The idea that human try to tame seemingly wild nature and capture it's most organized form (in the most organized way) is what engaged me with her photographs.