Nazareth art professor explores nature through photographs of natural forms that look like animals

It’s a photo exhibit two years in the making, as artist and professor Ron Netsky traveled throughout the Rochester area and the Catskills to find items in nature that demanded a second look. Many of these natural forms — living and dead trees and roots — look like animals. His photography exhibition, “Natural Selections: A Strange Bestiary,” is an exclusive look at discovering evocative shapes in nature. No images were altered in any way. 

The show opens at Nazareth’s Colacino Gallery in the Arts Center on Friday, Jan. 30, with an opening reception from 5-7 p.m. The show runs through March 8. Colacino Gallery Hours: Wednesday-Sunday noon-5 p.m. Closed Monday and Tuesday.

Netsky is celebrating 50 years at Nazareth University as an art professor, where he has taught printmaking since 1975. He’s always taken photos of roots and other beautiful natural shapes as source material for his lithographs and etchings. “A few years ago, I started to notice these animal forms emerging, so I began to look for them more consciously. It became a sort of challenge involving close observation,” said Netsky. 

He explains more about what drew him to work on his current photography exhibition.  

“Human beings have always gleaned order from chaos. Ancient civilizations connected the stars to form constellations and proceeded to attach significant meaning to them. I have always been fascinated by the interplay of order and chaos in nature. The unaltered photographs in this series can be seen as extreme examples of this. The title of the series alludes to Charles Darwin’s concept of natural selection, the process by which we, and every other living thing on earth, arrived – after millions of years – in our current forms. The photos are related to Gongshi (Chinese scholars’ rocks), natural forms that take on evocative shapes, and there is an element of illusion, reflected in titles containing references to René Magritte’s “The Treachery of Images.”The “natural selections” in these images show that within the randomness of nature, chaos can transform into order, even if it’s an absurd, fleeting order.” 

Netsky’s prints are included in the collection of the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., the Samuel Dorsky Museum of Art at SUNY New Paltz, and other museums. Netsky has served as a curator of several exhibitions, including Leaving for the Country: George Bellows at Woodstock, which originated at Rochester's Memorial Art Gallery before traveling to Chicago's Terra Museum of American Art and other museums.

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• published: 2025 December
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