Hello and welcome to my web site !!
My name is Paul Homsy, I have been enjoying photography since childhood.
I started shooting with professional equipment in 1978. My first "professional" assignment was photographing a known actress in Malibu as well as her subsequent interview on CBS's 60 minutes with the late Mike Wallace whom I had the pleasure to meet.
In January 2008, my work was showcased on the entire ground floor of the the Northeastern Nevada Museum. I am extremely grateful and humbled by this level of recognition and especially wish to thank the Wines family. I had the great privilege of meeting Honorable Gibbons, then governor of Nevada who was the guest of honor at the opening. One of my prints "Bringing them in" resides at the museum.
This website is a collection of recent photographs taken in the past two decades. I've always enjoyed photographing people and landscapes. My love of outdoors has enabled me to have the privilege of accessing a uniquely American slice of life.
First hand observation of ranching and cattle management have offered me a rare glimpse of its importance and given me a deeper understanding of this historically old lifestyle, still practiced in several states and the vital needs for its existence. The size of some of these enterprises, situated in huge expanses of land in spectacular settings, rivals that of smaller Eastern states.
Taking these photographs would never have been possible without the courtesy and warm hospitality of ranchers and organizations that helped me along the way as well as the publishers who sent me on numerous assignments trusting I would bring back photographs that would tell a story worthy of their pages. I've taken the vast majority of photographs from the saddle in order to provide the viewer with a close, palpable perspective and because it would have been impossible to obtain most of the images I was seeking by any other mean.I hope you will enjoy the ride as I did in great company, either on week long cattle drives from wintering grounds to Summer ranges' calving grounds, large gatherings, (cattle round ups) or a several days trip crossing the Continental Divide between Idaho and Montana. All made possible by my hosts without whom I wouldn't have been exposed to these unique, memorable experiences in distant landscapes. Shooting from the saddle, riding a moving horse isn't conducive to obtaining thousands of perfectly framed images, rather, many eye opening, inspiring fleeting moments worthy of recording hopefully for posterity. Anticipating the shot and taking it as fast as possible are both essential. I remember vividly all the "good ones" that I wasn't quick enough to capture.
The horizons and compositions are as originally captured. The quality may have at times suffered slightly because of the weather, too much movement and rain drops on my lenses but they portray what I saw. I hope you'll like them as much as I do. Their purpose is to bring to light the authenticity of the daily tasks surmounted by a very hardy, tenacious group of people whose dedication is obvious from the moment one understands the actual scale of work and its physical demands on a ranch. Operating quite often in challenging weather conditions or with untamed mounts, broncos seldom ridden with a temperament that represents the epitome of the West; strong, friendly, dependable and a little wild. The horses assigned as my mounts where generally carefully hand picked for their maturity, strength and good disposition. I have ridden with exceptionally skilled ranch hands in extreme dust and heat, negotiating narrow, steep mountain "cow trails" or facing, head on, strong cold winds accompanied by rain sleet and snow blowing horizontally, blinded, soaked and cold, far away from any road, with long days ahead and no shelter in sight. Exposed to the elements, they keep at their chore unflinchingly, undeterred. At other times, enjoying mild weather. I can't express in words how fortunate I feel to have participated in this lifestyle which provided me with a clear view of the massive undertaking required to maintain these enterprises which contribute to society on a grand scale.
I wish to very sincerely thank the following organizations.
The Northeastern Nevada Museum.
The P.R.C.A. (Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association)
Western Horseman magazine and calendar.
American Cowboy magazine.
Sierra Design Studio, Mammoth Lakes, CA
Flying "U" Ranch
Centennial Stock
The Tejon Ranch
Diamond "G" Ranch and Rodeo
The Deseret Ranch
The Gardner Ranch
The Spanish Ranch
The I.L. Ranch
Black Mountain Ranch
The Anchor Ranch
The Reeder Ranch
The Martin Ranch
The list of amazing people I met over the years is too long to enumerate in this initial effort to get this site moving. I am and will always be grateful to all of them.
These Western/cowboy images represent a lifestyle and I hope the interest of the collector will be inspired by their content. rather than where they were captured. They are a small part of a large body of work, photographed all over the West and have one thing in common; showing the day to day hard work of a rural, proud enterprising people who are the most universally recognizable civilian American palette of resilience, true grit and perseverance, and as such, are much bigger than their geographical point of origin. The Western lifestyle, which has inspired so many and myself, stands out more in my opinion and that of many, than most others in its uniqueness and is worthy of being part of anyone's collection of art. It is in parallel to similar ranching operations in Canada, Mexico and the entire continent of South America where skilled vaqueros and gauchos go on their daily task. My images were all captured in the United States. The Americas are the continents of the cowboy/buckaroo/vaquero where the original Vaqueros came centuries ago, at the time of the Conquistadors in California, with their Moorish bits and amazing skill with a "reata" (lasso). The tradition lives on.
I also wish to very sincerely thank the wonderful pageants, models and actresses with whom I've had the pleasure of working and whose gracious and tireless collaboration has yielded some very beautiful images that I hope you will find to your liking.
Copyright:
All images displayed currently and those that will be added, without any exception whatsoever have been taken by me and I am the owner of the copyrights of these images.
Releases:
I have in my possession releases for every single individual displayed in my images without any exception. These images are all legal to be displayed and sold either to individuals or businesses.
Thank you for your visit, your comments are very welcome !
Very sincerely,
Paul Homsy