Advertiser-Tribune

Andrew Kalnow has published the third and final volume of his photography book series, “Our Town & Country,” and in its pages are the local photographer’s answer to capturing Tiffin and Seneca County on photographic film in a time of both crisis and hope.

Kalnow writes in the foreword to the new book he had always planned to follow-up the first two volumes with a third, making it a trilogy, but some of the ideas originally in place for Volume 3 were upended when the pandemic hit.

“I had been planning to capture more people and action photos in Volume 3, but Covid put a damper on that, as all sorts of events were cancelled,” Kalnow’s foreword reads. “Then, there was the recession. Would people want to spend on another book that was similar to the preceding two volumes?

“I was stuck regarding what to do; to proceed this year or not with Volume 3.”

Kalnow said the height of his impasse regarding the direction of Volume 3 happened in concert with the first peak of the pandemic, in April. But the answer to his dilemma came to him in the form of a handful of letters in his mailbox, written by people who had enjoyed his previous books.

“These letters commented not only on how much they liked the first two volumes, but also that it was uplifting for them to look at the books again and again during the dark days of the Covid lock down,” the foreword reads.

“I realized I would need to do some pivots in terms of the subject matter of my photos,” it reads. “Less portraits would be available, as well as interesting photos of events, at least those that would normally be held May forward this year. Therefore, in this edition you will see me honoring a commitment to health and wellness by having a major chapter showing citizens with masks.”

Kalnow’s new volume features images of a town and county both recognizable and transformed, populated and emptied. Nature is given due reverence in its pages, and Kalnow’s photos of masked denizens of our area are not frightening or sorrowful but exuberant, with smiles peeking out from under every slung scrap of cloth.

Kalnow writes in the foreword that the people he photographed in masks even showed a tendency toward the fashionable in their face coverings.

“Do they make people look funny or stupid?” he asks. “Maybe in another time and place, but certainly not amid a deadly pandemic.

“I am sure we will look back in time and see these photos as a storied chapter in our history,” he adds.

Sites of local historical interest abound in the new volume as well, and places like the closed attic of the East Tower reveal their intimate secrets in these pages. Places of communal activity also feature in the volume, from shots of the Justice Center to a fountain show at National Corner to pics from a farmers’ market taking place on Jefferson Street.