Ants on the Melon

In these images, I search for objects and people of interest and combine them in an image that suggests a narrative. In this work I am investigating the aesthetic of the common person and their experiences. Although this work relates to a recognizable vernacular of portraiture, it both embraces and breaks from traditions. I control the background elements, softening them through focus, diffusion, and movement. This allows me to intensify the subject, thus creating an icon-like representation. I attempt to make images that vacillate between the concept of photograph as objective record or as personal testimony. The work is not intended to be an illustration of a preconceived point of view. I attempt to conceal the fact that the image is something created by me or that alerts the viewer of my presence or intent. In capturing a moment, not the time before or the time after, but the ephemeral moment, the camera has the ability to see through the subject's masquerades. I do not want to simply reflect what I see, but rather to reveal or disarm it. Photographs permit us to look at people with a prolonged intensity and an intimacy that we otherwise reserve only for extreme emotional states such as love.