Meet Eve Turek | Gallery Owner and Wildlife and Wildlands Photographer

We had the good fortune of connecting with Eve Turek and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Eve, do you disagree with some advice that is more or less universally accepted?
That you have to be competitive in order to win, that you have to “beat your competition.” That competition model of business doesn’t work for me at all. I prefer to be collaborative rather than competitive. Our brand identity is as a fine American craft and local/regional art and photography gallery.

As a business owner, two things are very important to me: that my artists and artisans thrive, and that my customers find treasures with us, that we attract those artists and those customers who are meant to connect through the art and craft we showcase. There is so much talent in the region, there is no way any one store could begin to offer all the possibilities, all the artists. So if an artisan approaches me, and I believe in their work but realize it won’t be a fit for my business, I try to take time with them so we can think together about where their work will fit best. That helps the entire artist community here. And I try to visit other galleries and gift shops, so when a customer asks me for something I don’t carry in my shop, I am better equipped to tell them where they should be able to find it.

Now I am going to switch gears and talk about my business and life role as a photographer, creating images for sale in my gallery. As a wildlife photographer, the conventional LANGUAGE of photography implies a mindset I disagree with. Photographers talk about “capturing” scenes or moments.
I don’t go into the field with the mindset of an apex predator, hunting with my camera, to capture an animal’s portrait or a moment of behavior. I go with the opposite intention. And I think that sets my work apart. I have a drive to deeply connect with the natural world, with wildlife, with birds, with the land itself. Every time I go out with my camera, I am asking to be led to the images that are meant for me to make. Nature photography in particular demands a ton of patience and patience becomes its own reward. I’m always alert to the light, to the play of light on the landscape out the window. I am always seeking a moment that is beyond beautiful – I am searching for moments that are transcendent. I say please and thank you when I photograph an animal or a bird. I want the person who views my landscapes and seascapes to feel as if they were there, right beside me, at that moment, and to receive the peace and joy I felt when I clicked the shutter. For my wildlife images, I want the love to come through, the feeling of connection.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
I self-identified for decades as a writer only rather than acknowledging any giftedness in a visual art. I am also a comfortable public speaker. My mother was an accomplished hobbyist painter, and I could not draw, so I never applied a visual artist label to myself in my youth or early adulthood. I viewed my journalistic photographs as documentary and useful but not artistic. Owning the gallery let me commit the time and effort required to increase my skills in landscape and wildlife photography which had always been my passion, without much time or opportunity to pursue either one.

I am inspired by nature itself. Since my name is Eve, I think about what that name means—Life—and I think about the metaphors I glean from the Eden stories of Beginning, when harmony was the blueprint, the original intention. So when I go into the field, into the wild, I am trying to go as a co-participant, as someone asking for moments of wonder and connection, striving to find, if you will, in the momentary click of a shutter, glimpses of that world. It’s not the world we usually see, but it is the world I long for and look for through my lens.

A passion project I am so excited about is my book Finding Refuge: Stories from Alligator River which is being published by Linda Lauby of Outer Banks Press. It will be available later this year as a coffeetable book, combining my photographs, some natural history, and personal reflections on my many years spent exploring the Alligator River National Wildlife Refuge in my home county.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
I chuckled over this question because my oldest continuous friend (we met in 8th grade and have never lost touch) and her husband visit me every year, and they are coming next week!! We definitely have favorite must-do’s! Some of those have changed over time as restaurants have changed, or closed. We like to eat at Salt Box Café or Colington Café, two excellent restaurants right on Colington Island close to where I live.

We also love eating at Blue Water Grill (inside) or Mimi’s Tiki Hut (outside) at the Pirate’s Cove marina – especially if Mimi’s has some live music.

We will always stop at Billy’s Seafood on Colington Road and pick up local shrimp, crabs and fish for a seafood feast here at the house.

Her husband loves to bring his metal detector and search for treasure, so we always go to one of the fishing piers where she and I can sit and sip something refreshing while he scavenges! Now that we all are older, their vacation goals now are always to relax and unwind, rather than to go-go-go as we all might have done when we had children at home. So their visit always includes plenty of time to stare at the ocean.

I am more “outdoorsy” generally than my friend is, but a couple years ago I took them to the Alligator River national wildlife refuge for the first time and they love it now as well. We can ride the dirt/gravel roads and watch Black Bears or Barred Owls or Alligators go about their daily lives in the wild and receive the peace and serenity that nature offers. I own a 4wd vehicle and I always buy a permit for the week they are here so I can take them to see the wild horses up on the beach in Carova. If I didn’t have the ability to drive there myself, I would be booking a tour through Corolla Outback Tours, because I know how much support they give quietly out of the public view to support the Corolla Wild Horse Fund. Now both a refuge trip and a trip to see horses are on their list of must-do’s when they come, and we typically will drive through the refuge several times.

Sometimes we will book a dolphin tour through Capt. Johnny’s in the sound as well.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
I could write half a book of shout-outs! First, I need to credit Mrs. Barbara Roth, the mother of my best friend in 6th grade, who introduced me to the Outer Banks that summer as I vacationed with my friend and her parents in their second home here. Later, as my high school journalism teacher, she taught me to develop black and white film. I moved to the Outer Banks a couple years out of high school, and my earlier career was dependent on the photographic skills I learned from her. She has long passed, but I hope somehow she knows how grateful I am.

A written work that was tremendously influential in changing the trajectory of my adult life is Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way. I worked my way through that book and others by her two years before my husband and I bought the gallery. I’m not sure I would have been as open to the life shift that entailed had I not been primed by the gentle questions and suggestions in The Artist’s Way.

As far as owning the gallery, I am indebted to Jack and Sue Sandberg (founders of Yellowhouse) and Paula Myatt (founder of SeaDragon) not only for their individual visions in creating thriving art galleries on the Outer Banks, but also for their mentoring me in my new responsibilities.

My late husband Pete was not only my life partner but my business partner as well. Being able to share a business life with him, to come home at the end of a busy gallery day and talk about OUR day, OUR plans for OUR future was a huge blessing. I miss him every moment of every day, and truthfully I would not be who or where I am today if not for his years of love and encouragement and partnership.

Website: https://www.evetureknaturephotography.com/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/eve.turek

Image Credits
Phyllis Kroetsch
Eve Turek