Picture of Success

Gallery tells story of photographer's 20-year career

By Joan Patterson
Review-Journal

     The saying, "patience of a saint," seems made for people like Susie Hadland.
      The longtime Las Vegan is the operator of the newly opened Gallery in the Sky, a business showcasing her photography on the 109th floor of the Stratosphere Tower. Every day the tower's roller coaster clanks and rumbles above her head, and tourists wander through her gallery with a steady stream of questions. And while most artists would get frustrated, she graciously volleys queries ranging from "Where do you find the roller coaster?" to "Where's the bathroom?"
      Those tourists who practice their own bit of patience, those who take the time to view the photographs skimming the walls of Hadland's shop, will see a world much different from the amusement park clamoring overhead. There are quiet shots of red barns in fields of buttercups and streams muted by morning mists. There are moody pictures of lighthouses perched on rocky bluffs and still white horses in lush green fields. Two decades of work gathered together under one surreal roof, perched in the eye of a giant needle that Hadland likes to think of as her own symbolic apex, her "top of the world," roller coaster and all.
      "This is so exciting to me. This feels like I put the last 20 years into something and now I'm achieving something. It's so fulfilling to have people buy and comment on your photos," says Hadland, who has green eyes and wavy blond hair that falls past her shoulders and in bangs across her forehead.
      Hadland, who is 53, was born in Montana and lived with her family on the Flathead Indian Reservation near Missoula. Her father worked on a ranch inside the reservation and also toured with the rodeo circuit as a bronco rider. He eventually dropped out of rodeos and the family moved to Las Vegas when Hadland was 7. He took a job as a truck driver and Hadland's mother continued to work as a nurse.
      At 23, Hadland married and eventually had two children. It was during this time her passion for photography began to take hold. While on family trips and hikes through local landmarks such as Red Rock Canyon, she would use her husband's camera to take photographs of the distinctive landscapes. She didn't know much about the technical side of camera work but quickly understood the joy of seeing life through the lens.
      "Just to see something and know I want to capture that image, then get it back and go, `Wow.' ... For some reason I just felt at peace with a camera in my hand," she says.
      Hadland and her husband divorced after 10 years, so at 33 she moved to Oregon with her sons. It was a good place for a fresh start, she thought, and an area of the country that fed her love of nature. They settled in Florence, a coastal town of about 4,000, and found a small neighborhood built on a bluff where their back yard was forest and the crash of ocean waves could be heard from their front door.
      During this time, Hadland purchased her first 35 mm camera, a Canon AE-1 that would became her constant companion. She photographed bridges and lighthouses, beach scenes and fishing piers. Her photos became good enough to capture the attention of two shop owners on the Florence wharf who started carrying her prints. Soon, Hadland had her first sales.
      After a few years in Oregon, Hadland decided her sons needed to be near their father so they moved back to Las Vegas. She took a job as a bartender but continually searched the papers for a job as a photographer until she found an ad from a local business called Studio One. She got the job and began photographing weddings and sports events such as the Caesars Grand Prix and marathons for long-distance runners.
      On one particular day in the early 1980s, she decided to take her camera to the Las Vegas Convention Center where the University of Nevada, Las Vegas basketball team was hosting a game. It was her day off but Hadland wanted to get some pictures of the players and fans for her portfolio. She tried getting in with a general press pass but to no avail. Then, as she was starting to leave, Hadland decided to give it one more try. She talked to a media relations representative and ended up with a season press pass.
      She would continue to go back and photograph the Rebels, eventually garnering a part-time job as photographer for the UNLV Basketball Alumni Association. In 1987, she traveled to the Far East with some former UNLV players to photograph exhibition games in Korea, Taiwan and Hong Kong. She also took pictures at local exhibition games that included stars such as Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson on the visiting teams. Because of her work with the Rebels, Hadland was given a one-woman show with the Las Vegas-Clark County Library District called "Rebels With a Cause" in 1985 and, again, in 1986.
      During this time, Studio One closed so Hadland needed to find full-time work. She became a legal assistant but still took photographs during her free time for the alumni association until 1990. She also opened Moonsets Photography in 1993, a studio specializing in events such as weddings and family reunions.
      The Stratosphere gallery opened in March after management at the casino learned about Hadland's work. They asked her to submit several samples, then called a few days later and offered her the gallery space. The casino had actually done a survey that showed a gallery, particularly one highlighting photographs, would be the best choice for that particular commercial space that sits between a bank of elevators and the entrance to the casino's observation deck. Hadland keeps a guest book that shows the mix of visitors walking through her gallery on their way to and from the observation deck. It includes tourists from Scotland, Yugoslavia, Japan, Latvia, Sweden and Mexico, Mo.
      Hadland stresses she is not a fine arts photographer who sets up detailed studio shots but, instead, uses nature as her own mutating canvas. She just gets in her car and drives. If something catches her eye, she stops. She does not use bulky large-format cameras or sit for hours with a tripod to steady her hand, she says. She relies more on those moments that seem meant for her eyes and the camera's lens. The images are usually found by accident, by turning a corner on some lonely road, she says.
      The locations are varied. There's Nipton, a tiny town south of Las Vegas where an old stucco outpost now serves as a bed-and-breakfast, Zion National Park, Mt. Charleston, Cold Creek and even the gardens at Ethel M Chocolates factory in Henderson. She has taken photos along the coast of central California, at some Oriental gardens in Spokane, Wash., along the banks of Lake Michigan and in the Montana wilderness.
      "Nature is just so awesome. There are so many great things (God) has created that I feel honored to have the gift to capture it," she says.
      Hadland, who has a fondness for angels and sells statuettes of the winged spirits alongside the dozens of framed photographs and greeting cards in her store, would like to open another gallery or two someday. In the meantime, she's just enjoying the view from the city's highest perch. It's been a long climb, she says, one she doesn't mind enjoying for a while. And if she can point someone to the bathrooms or give directions to the roller coaster, then why not. Maybe, along the way, they'll enjoy a photograph or two.
 

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