Swap Meet: This is San Bernardino

These images are from my ongoing series "Swap Meet: This is San Bernardino". I am interested in showing the vitality of this place and and its people. I want to celebrate the families and individuals who come each week to buy and sell, and who revel in this friendly, communal experience. My photographs celebrate the intensity of the light and heat, and marvel at the assortment of stuff bought and sold. I am fascinated by the design and arrangement of the vendors’ tents and booths, and how the goods are arranged. These arrangements reveal the character and tastes of the vendors, and those who are enticed to stop and shop at their booths. The swap meet is a metaphor for life. It is crowded and chaotic with myriad attempts at organization, commerce, friendship and rivalries all playing out on the open stage of human spectacle, within the socially and economically depressed city of San Bernardino.