On most occasions, I prefer black-and-white photography to color�but in the case of Mary Lang, a Massachusetts-based landscape photographer who works in both, I have to admit to favoring color.

Lang, influenced by 30 years of practicing Buddhist meditation, photographs peaceful settings in New England and elsewhere�calm, silvery ponds; graceful waves gliding over a sandy beach; dark, rippled water rolling gently in the moonlight. Others capture underwater bubbles or light glinting off asphalt that�s been patched in a pattern that recalls Arabic calligraphy. (Street Graffiti is pictured.)

Lang�s black-and-white images don�t have the crystal-clear contrast made famous by Ansel Adams, Edward Weston, or a host of imitators; instead, her images limn their subjects in grainy charcoal tones. Her color works also come infused with a subtle palette�so subtle, in fact, that the term �color� must be used loosely: In a few of them, it�s initially hard to distinguish the color tinctures that set them apart.

In one ever-so-slightly blue-toned image, arguably Lang�s finest, a line of surface footprints serves as the only guide to understanding up and down, surface and depth�though the image is still sufficiently mysterious that it�s folly to think you�ve understood it for sure. The closest analog I can think of are the late Polaroid images taken by an elderly Andr� Kert�sz in the �70s�currently on view as part of the National Gallery of Art�s Kert�sz retrospective�in which eccentric, bold colors seem to flow with an almost liquid consistency.

Her work is on view from noon to 3 p.m. Tuesday to Friday, and from noon to 6 p.m. Saturday to Wednesday, March 15, at Fraser Gallery, 1054 31st St. NW. Free. (202) 298-6450.

Louis Jacobson

� Copyright 2005 Washington City Paper