By Sally Quale

Since 1994, Dr. David Leffell, a world-renowned dermatologist and author of several dermatology publications, has been coming to Norfolk with his wife Cindy and their two children. Initially summer renters and subsequently homeowners, the Leffells spend as much time here as they can depending on their busy weekly schedules in New Haven.

Aside from his roles as chief executive officer of the Yale Medical Group, deputy dean for clinical affairs at the Yale School of Medicine, a professor of dermatology and surgery and a practicing specialist in skin cancer, melanoma and plastic reconstruction, Leffell is also a passionate photographer.

Now, with the help of his niece, curator and designer Rebecca Leffell, he has just published a handsome, large-format collection of 63 of his full-color photographs. All were taken in northwest Connecticut and southwestern Massachusetts, with at least one-third of the photographed locations in Norfolk.  

It was during his family’s first summer in Norfolk, at a rented camp on Doolittle Lake, that Leffell’s initial interest in photography was triggered. Over that summer, rising early each day and experiencing the crisp coolness of the air, the smells and the sights along the misted shoreline, he soon realized how much he was reminded of his native land, Quebec.

As he writes in his book’s preface, “There [in Quebec], the smell of pine trees, the unbridled freedom we enjoyed as children and the frigid morning air impressed memories that I had hoped to re-create for my own family.” As a result, they purchased their current home in north Norfolk and Leffell continued to capture on his camera, with increasing skill and passion, his children’s future memories of the surrounding environment.  

The photographs in “Connecticut Pastoral” are, as a whole, iconic images of our region, but there are a few notable angles to Leffell’s choices of subject matter, such as his special interest in the range of effects that sunlight has upon objects, both positive and negative. While sunlight brings the growth of beautiful flowers, it can also destroy objects, peeling the white paint from a slowly-decaying old homestead, as shown in one photo. This negative aspect of sunlight, Leffell notes, relates closely to his professional work involving the sun’s effects on skin.

His fascination with reflections on water (“another trick with light,” he says) is also quite evident. A good number of his nature photographs may seem at first to be puzzlement, until readers look more carefully and realize they are actually looking at a liquid portrait.

Leffell has donated a copy of “Connecticut Pastoral” to the Norfolk Library for residents to enjoy, perhaps while attempting to identify those photographs taken at locations in Norfolk. The book is also available for purchase at www.gaohpress.com and www.amazon.com.