Robert Llewellyn

Robert Llewellyn (born December 29, 1945) is an American photographer whose images have served as the basis for numerous books and exhibits. He studied engineering science at the University of Virginia, and photography with Imogen Cunningham in the 1960s. He married Barbara Reading Grant in 1981 and they live together in Earlysville, Virginia.

Thirty five books have been based on Llewellyn's photographs, which have also been featured in numerous art exhibits. His Washington, The Capital (1981) was an official diplomatic gift of the White House and U.S. State Department. With Remarkable Trees of Virginia (2008), the capstone of a statewide effort to document Virginia's most remarkable trees, Llewellyn developed a special focus on photography of landscapes and trees.

The Living Forest: A Visual Journey Into the Heart of the Woods, considered a "spectacular journey deep into the heart of the forest," includes 305 of Llewellyn's photographs displayed with the writing of Joan Maloof.

Robert Boxley Llewellyn, Sr. was manager of the family harness shop in South Boston, while Llewellyn's maternal grandfather, Walter Glass Kent, served as station manager for the Norfolk and Western Railroad in Vinton, Virginia (a town bordering Roanoke). Llewellyn's father, Robert Boxley Llewellyn, Jr., born in 1918 in Prince Edward County, Virginia, was working as a surveyor's assistant when he joined the Army in 1944. He served in the 8th Army Infantry during the Asiatic-Pacific Campaign as First lieutenant through 1946. He died in 1957 in Winston-Salem, North Carolina where he worked at the time.

Llewellyn's mother, born August 2, 1918, in Halifax, Virginia, married his father on June 28, 1941, in Vinton. She was graduated from Jefferson High School in Roanoke in 1936, where she was considered "(a)n artistic and ambitious Vintonian". She attended the State Normal School for Women at Harrisonburg — which later became James Madison University — graduating in 1940 with a focus in studio arts. She died October 23, 1947.

Education Llewellyn first worked with a camera in high school. He became editor of the yearbook his senior year, "tasked with documenting student life." He walked around campus with a Nikon camera around his neck the entire year. He recalls:

In 1963, Llewellyn was among 20 Virginia high school students selected to participate in "one-of-a-kind electronics program" coordinated by the Roanoke school system with the University of Virginia. He attended the University of Virginia in Charlottesville between 1964 and 1968, studying Engineering Science. He studied photography under noted photographer Imogen Cunningham in Eureka, California in 1968.

Washington, The Capital (1981) Washington, The Capital — published with 89 photographs by Llewellyn through Thomasson-Grant, Inc. in 1981 – became, leatherbound with a gold-leaf presidential seal, the White House gift to visiting dignitaries.

Three thousand copies of the book were also accepted on behalf of the U.S. State Department to be used as an official gift to foreign dignitaries. Five major corporations, including Anheuser-Busch and Martin Marietta, used the book as a gift to visitors to the capital city. As stated on the cover: "These photographs of the capital of the New World show not only the Washington of today, but the essential Washington that may remain throughout the eternal tomorrows." |source=San Francisco Examiner

Remarkable Trees of Virginia (2008) In 2004, Llewellyn met the garden columnist of the Richmond Times-Dispatch, Nancy Ross Hugo, who was considering creating a book about Virginia trees. Their collaboration would result in three publications, the "inaugural project" being a four-year effort to document one hundred of Virginia's "largest, oldest, most historic, beautiful and beloved trees." This resulted in the 2008 publication of the "keepsake book" A famous "old willow oak", called the "tricycle tree" after the two young brothers who fastened a tricycle in the limbs to hoist treasures up to their tree house 1908, also passed away in Ashland.

Dr. Kirwan and Hugo had worked together previously on Virginia's Big Tree Program, which similarly encouraged the nomination of remarkable trees from communities. The Remarkable Trees database now also includes trees of Washington, D.C.

Seeing Trees (2011) Working again with Nancy Ross Hugo as writer, Llewellyn published Seeing Trees: Discover the Extraordinary Secrets of Everyday Trees with 180 of his photographs through Timber Press in 2011. In this book, Llewellyn reveals "an unexpected and alien beauty" that can be discovered in the minute detail of trees. The Virginia pine tree "sports baby, adolescent and mature cones all on the same branch." Acorns of the sawtooth oak are wrapped in tufts like sea anemones. The pink flower of the redbud looks like a hummingbird. The Washington Post said, "The authors have brought the level of observation to new heights, presenting the daintiest parts of trees — buds, flower parts and seeds in various stages of ripening — in a way that hasn't been seen, generally." |sign=Richard Powers|source=author The Overstory (winner 2019 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction)

The Living Forest (2017) The Living Forest: A Visual Journey Into the Heart of the Woods, created with Llewellyn's images and words by Joan Maloof, a biology and environmental studies professor at Salisbury University and founder and director of the Old-Growth Forest Network, was published through Timber Press in 2017. The photographic work considers the forest as "a complex, interconnected ecosystem filled with plants, birds, mammals, insects, and fungi," making for a visual journey that immerses the reader "deep into the woods." Llewellyn's "wide-ranging photography" highlights "the small and the large, the living and the dead, and the seen and the unseen."

Llewellyn recalls how Maloof made the process more engaging:

Quote|text=We'd go out into the forest and she would say to me, 'Turn over that log. What do you see?' I would say, 'What will I see?' She would never tell me. It was all about discovery.

Honors, awards, and distinctions

Introduced guests to the world of micro-photography at The Garden Club of Virginia's Symposium 2022, Grow Your Knowledge, September 20–21, 2022 at the Science Museum of Virginia in Richmond. Llewellyn was featured in the first episode of the 2019–2020 Charlottesville Inside-Out (CVIO) series with Terri Allard January 10, 2019, on WHTJ/WCVE/WVPT PBS. His Washington, The Capital (1981) was an official diplomatic gift of the White House and U.S. State Department. 2008 – "Remarkable Trees of Virginia" at the Edith J. Carrier Arboretum in Harrisonburg, Virginia. 2009 – "Remarkable Trees of Virginia" at the George Washington Birthplace National Monument in Colonial Beach, Virginia. 2009 – "Seeing Trees" at the Darrin-McHone Gallery in Harrisonburg, Virginia. 2010 – "Trees" in the Silo Installation at Firnew Gallery in Hood, Virginia. 2011 – "Seeing Trees" in the Speak! Gallery in Charlottesville, Virginia. 2011 – "Flora Photographica" at the United States Botanic Garden in Washington, DC. 2012 – "Natural Wonders" in the Page Bond Gallery in Richmond, Virginia. 2012 – "Seeing Trees" at the Lewis Ginter Botanical Gardens in Richmond, Virginia. 2013 – "Flower" in the Page Bond Gallery in Richmond, Virginia. 2013 – "Nature's Design, the Botanical Photographs of Robert Llewellyn" Greenville Museum of Art in Greenville, North Carolina.