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The Turkish Restaurateurs
Continue ReadingI admire Adem’s nose. It makes a straight vigorous statement. I met him in Selçuk, a town on the Turquoise Coast. A few days prior to posing for this portrait, he opened his first business — this restaurant where he now stands. Next to him on a warm grill in cast iron pans he has […]
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Iconic Musician, Interpreted
Continue ReadingI watched this man work up-close live onstage through many potent hours. He performed shirtless, barefoot and dread-locked, played mixed drums with the power of three people. Above I peeled back his public face and surface appearance, folding time and history aside, an attempt to reveal the iconic musician and archetype beneath. A more conventional […]
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Modeling Patriotism
Continue ReadingEach tribe or nation-state shows off its pride and determination. Many parade their army, navy, air forces. I made this photograph at an early-18th century frontier encampment along the Ohio River near Paducah, Kentucky. There is a twist here: these armed militia men express their patriotism for a nation not yet in existence — it […]
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Children Are The Universal Subjects
Continue ReadingThe image above comes from my personal collection. It was given to me for editing by a friend, a layman photographer using a simple camera. He captured something special here. I do not know the exact context; whatever the occasion, the girls seem dressed in their very best and most festive outfits. Among the sisters […]
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Photo Sequence — The Turkish Saleslady
Continue ReadingI share four portraits made in a Turkish market — ordered consecutively — beginning with our subject’s salutation. The lady had linens for sale: table-cloths, scarves, bed sheets and other pieces, some expertly embroidered. She was an accomplished actress; at her command she had an array of facial expressions, from greetings to allurements to frowns […]
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Concerning The Elvis Mythology
Continue ReadingI know for sure Elvis is gone. I visited his grave once. That happened in the yard at Graceland Mansion in Tennessee where I sensed only his symbolic reality with no animating presence. Beside me three fellow tourists lined up in a different attitude, folded their hands and bowed their heads, behaving as if they […]
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Approaching Arabic
Continue ReadingKnowledge of Arabic opens a civilization stretching thirteen thousand kilometers wide — from Morocco eastward to Indonesia. In that vast territory not everyone speaks with the Arab tongue in daily life, yet most build their spiritual life upon the Koran, delivered to the Messenger of God Mohamed by visionary experience in the idiom of the […]
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Americana Favorites: Two Ladies In A Green Truck
Continue ReadingThe women perform matching smiles, broad and almost natural, full of bright teeth. Attached to their vintage American truck, we find a spare tire looking as if freshly lifted off the Firestone rack; the rubber is pristine, soaked recently in shine oil. Notice the burnished-until-golden door handle. I cannot say for sure whether the youngster […]
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American Iconography
Continue ReadingRugged and broad-shouldered, luxuriously bewhiskered, even when weighed on a scale opposite Moses of the Bible and the Prophets. Masculine and virile, he would thrive on the 18th century frontier among wilderness hunters and pathfinders — a raw and sometimes brutal life of hard labor — chopping trees, cutting trails, living by the rifle and […]
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What Is The Principle Here?
Continue ReadingAn American in poor physical condition struggles toward the end of a marathon run in humid weather. His face appears to show utter exhaustion and a gasping for breath. He acted we presume by choice — but according to what principle of motivation?
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