OBSERVATIONS

What is photography if not the act of recording observations? Each of these images records a moment of astonishment at how things in the world connect, sometimes through shape or form, or contrasts or on some other level. For example, the first picture here shows a Mayan man who sells souvenirs from his cart at the site of Chichen Itza, a Mayan pyramid. The shape of his cart is that of the pyramid inverted. It is a visual pun that suggests to me the historic inversion of Mayan culture and power. Other observations are simpler: the leaf is red and green, the painted floor was red and green. Both have changed colours because of decay. I thought it looked pretty. Hair like a lion's mane, a man and a monkey with the same coiffure, a souvenir shop with no souvenirs, like a form of memory loss, reflections of people taking pictures when photography itself is just a reflection. Sometimes I am drawn to photograph something though I am not sure why. The subtext only reaches my conscious mind later. But it all speaks to me in a whisper.