A collective of New York buildings
Truthful Fiction
The Brazilian film “City of God” remains for many reasons locked in my mind- -front and center: It is the tiny idea that in a gigantic earth is a whisper of a visual concept- - standing for almost every photograph I make- -It reminds my camera that every city frames a repeating dream a repeating nightmare: Something is happening: I cannot determine unless I land in the center of the action: The action is silent and yet volatile: My camera needs to be there forever and ever: A capture- -my capture needs to be made to fill the voids- -fill the space between here and there.
Every city reminds of “City…”The unknown elevates the senses: It is a prickly sensation that surges to the tips of a mass of nerve endings: Visions in the dark, shadows in my vision invoke such likely narratives broadly spaced from Jack the Ripper to space exploration: The unknown is where my camera resides when not abound.
A single nightmare: Imagine rotary wings above. Something apocalyptic something now. Collective thumps hovering: Rio de Janeiro’s favela/ghetto beckons below: The helicopter pilot wishes to lower me: He mimes a shouldered missle launcher: For a nano second I am part of some thrilling adventure:
Tokyo’s Apple Store
Dangers of the massive unknown pose in unfathomable quietude: My camera salivates around and about the possibilities: Christ the Redeemer stands atop Corcovado Mountain: Shadowy missives appear: A massive collective of danger is imagined: I want to lean below the landing skids to clearly see: I am locked in but need to free fall: I have pictures to make: Rio could be mine in a single shutter release.
The idea of idyllic cinematic scenic backdrops as in movie magic Black Narcissus appear: Ideas saturated in colors: Ideas dyed as in autochrome: One by one, images flash and more imaginary follow: I am seen conjuring the possibilities as Einstein may calculate equations: To be alive to make something fresh. A few thousand feet above sea level my feet dance tap like Bill “Bojangles” Robinson: So many voids to fill: So many historical shadowy voids below to account for within a single frame:
New York’s Empire State Building and iconic New Yorker sign and much more
I have imagined cities built through the centuries: They arrived in mind, pixelated in shadowy colors mimicking time-lapse photography filling the voids of time and history:
I race to fend off Eugene O’Neil’s, “There is no present or future—only the past, happening over and over again—now.” I will not allow that to be the case: I need to imagine more: I need each city to be new: I need to be presented with a new light a new approach a newer than new capture:
I am almost always dreaming the impossible: I measure my years in cameras’ fractions: I have little time to review my life or the history of the planet in my rear view- -I am starved for a lasting memory- -A place where adventures were had- -a place that lies ahead:
Tokyo: The National Museum of Modern Art