MEMBER PROFILE
ELLEN ZACHOS
Rocky Start Did Not Dissuade Award-Winning Photographer
PHOTO COURTESY ED CUNICELLI
Rob Cardillo is well known among garden communicators. His outstanding plant and landscape photography has been honored with numerous GWA Media Awards, and he was elected to the GWA Hall of Fame in 2015.
But how many of you know that“ Mr. Cardillo,” in his earlier years as a budding paleontologist, discovered a quarry in northern New Mexico full of amphibian and reptile bones dating from the Paleozoic Era? That’ s right, the Cardillo Quarry is named after our own Rob, who discovered it while working at Pittsburgh’ s Carnegie Museum of Natural History, his first job after graduating from college.
That’ s when Rob started carrying a camera. It was a tool, helpful for documenting fieldwork in interesting places. When he moved from the Carnegie Museum to Philadelphia’ s Academy of Natural Sciences, Rob first worked in the herbarium and then in the ornithology department, where he helped build an image library( yes, they were slides back then) that aimed to document every bird species in the world.
FOR THE BIRDS
For four or five years, Rob focused on bird photography, and once again made a historic discovery, this time while on his honeymoon in Nantucket, Massachusetts. He and his wife Sue found and photographed the western reef heron, which had never been spotted in the western hemisphere.
Rob claims these discoveries are just examples of being in the right place at the right time, but don’ t believe that for a second. Rob has an eye. And a deep love for the natural world, whether it’ s dinosaur fossils, bird species or plants and landscapes.
While still at the Academy of Natural Sciences, Rob took photography classes at a local university. A career in natural history
would have required a Ph. D., which Rob decided wasn’ t what he wanted. Instead, he accepted a job as photo editor for Organic Gardening magazine at Rodale Press. For 11 years, Rob enjoyed working as part of a journalistic team that shared his appreciation of nature. He got to know some excellent photographers along the way, including an early mentor, Walter Chandoha, a GWA Fellow and member of the GWA Hall of Fame. Eventually, Rob decided to go out on his own and see how far he’ d get.
He’ s gotten pretty far.
GWA FOSTERS COLLABORATION
After leaving Rodale, Rob attended a GWA meeting at the Philadelphia Flower Show and very quickly realized that“ these were my people.” The life of a freelancer can be lonely at times, and in GWA Rob found a generous and talented group of people, who were willing to share what they knew. Membership gave him the chance to develop relationships with fellow photographers, and the opportunity to talk about shared problems and discoveries.
To this day he appreciates the spirit of giving and helping that is prevalent in GWA. Being part of the garden communicator community offers so many opportunities for collaboration, which gives him great satisfaction. Rob says he always comes away from these collaborations more enriched. Having worked with Rob, I can say the feeling is mutual.
Rob admits his own garden isn’ t the most beautiful in the neighborhood. Those of us who work most doggedly during the growing season understand letting our personal landscape get a little ragged around the edges. Also, Rob describes himself as a plant collector, someone who’ s liable to come home from a GWA meeting with more cuttings and plant samples than he can accommodate on his corner lot. But they’ re all so interesting and new that Rob can’ t resist them. What little gardening time he does have is spent with Sue in their vegetable garden, which Rob admits( if pressed) is pretty good.
WHAT ELSE HE’ S UP TO
I asked Rob if he had a hobby, something he does to relax and unwind after a long day of lugging around a heavy tripod. He said he gets so much satisfaction from his work that he hasn’ t thought much about a hobby. This winter’ s work includes reducing his huge slide library to a manageable number of images.( Rob will be writing about this process soon in On the QT.) He also has two books in the works for 2017.
These days Rob is the photography director for GROW Magazine, a publication of the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society, which won last year’ s Gold Media Award for best overall magazine. He enjoys this project not only because it’ s a beautiful, rich, and diverse magazine, but also because he’ s working with three friends he’ s known for more than 20 years. The network of garden communicators continues to thrive and produce things of beauty, thanks to people like Rob Cardillo.
Ellen Zachos is the author of seven books, including Backyard Foraging: 65 Familiar Plants You Didn’ t Know You Could Eat and The Wildcrafted Cocktail. She is a regular contributor to several of the Edible magazines, and a Senior Regional Advisor at Garden Compass, a plant identification app. She also works with RemyUSA, teaching foraged mixology workshops across the US for The Botanist Gin. Ellen share recipes and tips about foraging at backyardforager. com
14