Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial & Cherry Blossoms II

This monument in Washington, D.C. honors Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and his role in leading the civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s. He was a Baptist minister who played a pivotal role in ending the legal segregation of African American citizens in the United States. He led the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom which brought a quarter of a million peaceful protestors to the National Mall in D.C. The nearby Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool has become a symbolically sacred site for the civil rights movement where on the steps of the memorial, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. gave his “I Have a Dream” speech. Built in 2011, the 30-foot-tall memorial and mountains were made from 159 granite blocks. It’s location at 1964 Independence Avenue, SW references the year the Civil Rights Act of 1964 became law.

Washington, D.C. is not a large city like New York City with the plethora of tall buildings as far as the eye can see. Rather it is filled with many unique sites and monuments which make up the cohesive whole; one of those iconic sites now being the MLK, Jr. Memorial along with the cherry blossoms at the Tidal Basin on the National Mall. The Washington, D.C. cherry blossom peak bloom in late March / early April attracts an estimated 1.5 million visitors a year to experience the nearly 3800 cherry trees.

It's never easy to predict the peak bloom of the cherry blossoms in D.C., so I keep a close eye on the weather and make it downtown on my bike close to the time to see for myself. I wanted to capture the monument to MLK, Jr. framed by the flowering cherry trees in their peak bloom. On Sunday when the weather cleared after almost a week of clouds and intermittent rain, thousands of people and I had the same idea to visit. That made it impossible to achieve the pristine scene I visualized in my final image.

Fortunately, I had the flexibility to come back the next day when most of the locals and visitors from out of town had to get about their lives. With only a tenth of the people that were there Sunday, I had my fingers crossed that the weather would agree. Sunrise was an overcast bust, but as my made my way to this location, the sun burst through the clouds. I had a brief window where the golden hour’s warm light shone directly on the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial and the surrounding trees. I made quick work of it since I knew the light could go at any moment. I shot the ground-level row with the blossoms and monument first. Afterwards, I shot the series again in the same position for the source images to mask in the sections of each photo without people for my final component images. All said and done, this VAST Photo was made by sifting 150 images from over 500, from different positions to make the final composite of 60 images (3 Rows of 20). Shortly after taking this series, the cloud coverage returned and it rained for the rest of the day. I was thankful for the return visit and to be in the right place and time to catch this moment at this inspiring monument.