Photographer Kay Walsh leaves the shutter wide open.

Ocean sailing made Kay Walsh a fine black-and-white photographer.

Walsh and her husband took early retirement really early – she was only 37 – and set sail from 1987 to 2000.

Although they never completely circumvented the world, they did log 75,000 miles. At that point, land “looked really good.”

After returning home to Seattle, they decided Bainbridge was where they belonged.

“I lived outside basically for 12 years,” Walsh said. “I really do think my sailing has dictated my photography. It’s so ensconced in my mindset.”

That she creates motion in still photographs comes from being at sea so long. The self-taught artist – a zoologist by training – is drawn to the open spaces in the West that are increasingly hard to find.

Walsh is one of three photographers featured in Bainbridge Arts and Crafts’ August exhibit, “Women Behind the Lens: Black and White Photography.” With her are Diane Walker of Bainbridge and Colleen Meacham of Kirkland.

“They’ve chosen only my most dramatic pictures,” said Walsh, who dips her head under the black cloth of a 4-by-5 field camera to capture the large images she favors. “I’m delighted.”

Walsh’s photography style requires a seven- or even 10-minute exposure time, which “distills the picture to its essence,” she said.

She uses the seven-minute exposure when she’s photographing water and trying to capture a little bit of its movement.

“It’s almost ethereal,” she said. “It’s not practical. You’re never sure what you’re going to get.”

Black and white photography is an evolved art form, “something you grow into.” Walsh tackles it in old-school fashion, with her “very, very old timey” camera and “all still wet chemistry that is dying a slow death.” The process is completely hands-on.

“You have to take one picture at a time, develop one negative at a time and develop them differently,” she said. “Each negative has its own dictates.”

With digitial, “you just don’t smell that chemistry or get your fingers wet. For people like me, it’s going to take a real effort to keep it going,” she said, adding it’s a challenge to find the photography paper she needs.

Walsh’s bread and butter is digital interior design and landscape photography. Black and white photography is her art.

She traverses Montana, Oregon, Canada, Utah and Arizona in a four-wheel-drive truck to capture the vastness she craves.

“I’m trying to tap into the remnants in the West. Even in Montana it’s hard to find places that aren’t fenced,” she said.

Walsh’s success surprises her, as she has only been on Bainbridge seven years. What matters most, though, is that her work is noted.

“They don’t have to buy it. They just have to look at it,” she said. “Most people look at a picture and say, ‘I could do that.’ I dare them.”

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It’s black and white

“Women Behind the Lens: Black and White Photography” is on exhibit Aug. 4 to 29 at Bainbridge Arts and Crafts. An artists’ reception will be held from 6 to 8 p.m. Aug. 4. BAC is open 10 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday through Saturday and 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday. For information call 842-3132.