Photographs

These 250 photographs are representative of my body of work, which consists of 21,000 prints that were culled from 13,000 rolls of film. It is not though conclusive; my goal wasn’t to make a greatest hits selection. Instead I tried recounting my path, with images as markers along the way. Immediate and unmediated responses are part of my photographic DNA, and these instincts would dominate my thought and imagery for fifty years of nonstop photographing. My work ethic was clear from the start–incessant and obsessive. There is no other way to mine one’s interior resources. In this way, the work defined itself and me, and it does this more than it defines places. There is no other way to live if one is to live creatively, regardless of the cost. Once I discovered the Leica camera, while an undergraduate, there was no turning back, just a faithful plunge forward.

Many of the photographs were changed throughout the process of assembling this portfolio, substituting one for another. It was like a jigsaw puzzle, but one that was impossible to complete…an endless process, fluid and mutable. There were thousands of other photographs that could fit. But I wrapped it up in 2020. With the onslaught of the Covid-19 pandemic I thought it a fitting time to turn the page on this life-long chapter and see what changes to society and self would emerge.