Photography

as my spirit drifts

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The universe, in response to my unrelenting quest

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The universe, in response to my unrelenting quest, revealed its true nature to me. Only that I cannot convey its perfection by any means, as it exists beyond the limitations of language, or any other form of expression. And it is this very impossibility that lies at the heart of every photograph and every piece of writing I have created since this unveiling. The chance to express even a momentary glimpse of that eternal, perfect realm is enough to fuel my soul through this life and into whatever may arise after.

Happy Fourth!

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This red and blue photograph signifies the heart of Fourth of July celebrations: Fireworks! Captured during the firework display at Astoria Park in Queens, this image includes the iconic Hell Gate Bridge alongside views of New York City in the background.

Quiet Moments

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Distance

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Where your focus goes, energy grows.

Absence / Presence

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I was once engulfed in the depths of absence. The piercing light returned my soul to presence. Yet every so often I catch a glimpse of the underground. The shadows remain to give form to the otherwise obscure nature of eternity. One cannot be known without the contrast of the other.

Winter in Astoria, Queens

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Warmth

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Warmth is a state of inner being: when what remains dark is no longer hidden, where the walls of fear crumble and armor of defense drops, to reveal an angle of my soul that is among the most representative facets of who I am at my truest.

Photographs taken in Queens, New York, recently added to the series Traces of Silence.

Think Less, Feel More

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The more time that passes from my studies at grad school, the more I am drawn to the simple. Not the theoretically complex simple, not the complex masking itself in veiled simplicity, just, simple. It was necessary to learn theory and history, to be so inside the ‘mind’ of it all, but I have become increasingly disinterested in making art that ‘challenges’ the medium or even makes the viewer think in any way. There are enough things in this world that make us think and keep us locked inside our well-furnished minds - what I find is an increasingly dwindling space of experiences that makes us FEEL. I hope for my photographs to make you feel something, maybe peace, something unexpected, maybe it enlivens a long forgotten cob-webbed memory, maybe something similar to what it conjures within myself, maybe nothing at all, maybe the sharp pain of apathy.

Anything to help you feel the fullness of what it means to be you, alive and breathing through those lungs - with your own thoughts and memories and ways of looking at the world; With your own unseen universe that I can only imagine how cavernous and wonderful it is. As Robert Frank so succinctly put, “when people look at my photographs, I want them to feel the way they do when they want to read a line of a poem twice.”

I am in the process of re-learning how to think less, and feel more.

 

Someone In My Dream Asked Me What Your Name Was, 2023, from the ongoing series Traces of Silence

 

A Quiet Fall

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I make photographs that I hope carry a feeling, a feeling you may resonate or empathize with, whether it mirrors my own feelings or not. I see my photos as passing glimmers that offer a kind of fissure into my innerworkings. Of all seasons, my soul feels akin to fall most of all - it is quiet yet alive in all its vibrancy, it is dying and yet ever becoming, alive in a ceaseless state of transformation.

 

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“Always be yourself, express yourself, have faith in yourself, do not go
out and look for a successful personality and duplicate it.” - Bruce Lee

A weekend at New York Martial Arts Academy, Brooklyn, during the Sifu Chris Kent Seminar

Photography was that first tool of self expression that overtook me with its undefinable power to transform and cleanse the lens of my internal perception. It is a tool that can both refine or reinforce, depending on how it is used. If used in what I believe to be its higher purpose, photography can help you feel more fully grounded in the life you’re living, or even free yourself from your present reality, if that is what saves your soul in the short term. For me, photography helps me to see more clearly - not externally, but internally. The act of photographing, allowing me to re-see what I thought I knew, helps me to feel more involved and at one with the life around and within me. It is very easy to detach so intensely that the very experience of human-ness feels foreign, and while I find that helpful when clearing my mind and connecting to that higher spirit, it is not a state I wish to constantly exist through. In day to day life, I want to feel everything, to feel embedded into the very fabric of life that is all around and within me, to find no gap or separation between the seer and the seen.