Reflections From the Road
These essays are also available in video form on my YouTube channel.
The Artist and What We Choose to See
Artists have long stood at the forefront of social change, not simply as commentators on their societies, but as forces that shape what those societies are willing to see. From Picasso’s response to the violence of Guernica to the unsettling clarity of Baldwin’s prose or the quiet insistence of Dorothea Lange’s photographs, creative work has repeatedly altered the boundaries of public awareness. Art does more than reflect the world as it is. It shifts attention, reframes experience, and, in doing so, changes what a culture can no longer ignore.
The Rest Goes Out with the Tide
Loss can move in both directions. We lose people, and we also lose the version of ourselves that existed with them. In Sealskin, Jeff Dworsky’s photographs sit in that space. They aren’t distant observations of someone else’s life; they are the life. His children grow. The seasons change. Work is done and undone. And then something shifts, a presence is gone, though the photographs never name it.
Still Looking
I used to think the best photos came from faraway places.
Morning fog in the Alps. Golden hour in Morocco. Some crumbling archway…