I find the power of photography to be amazing in its ability to say so much in the recording of a seemingly frozen moment of time. There is a deep impulse in me to use this medium to seek out, help create and visually record the pinnacle moment of an event, time, place, circumstance or relationship, wherein everything comes together in the form of light, emotion, mood, feeling, composition, shape, form and mystery, for usually only a split second. The combination of these subtle nuances and synchronicities happens so fast I can never be sure if I truly pulled it off until close examination of the final reproduced image. There is definitely some magic involved.

To me, a great image will hold that power eternally and take the viewer, non self-consciously, at any time, directly into the feeling of that time and place. Photography in this way is truly “a magical transcendental activity”. A great photograph, as with any great art, transcends mind, time, space, religion, language, race and all difference. It remains alive and connects us to the subject in an instant through our feeling, prior to the verbal and analytical mind. In its greatest achievement, a great image will give us the intuition of a greater or Divine reality, which we all intuit exists within our own understanding. In that way Art can have a healing effect on the viewer. Images of this quality grow on us as we live with them in the spaces we occupy. They may even change with us as we grow and reveal more of their subtleties over time. In this sense the art is truly alive and ever changing to each individual viewer. One never seems to tire of this kind of art. These are the images I strive to create.

My approach to photography is a relational one. I participate and really get involved with the people I work with, to help invoke in them their response, rather than standing aside and merely looking on as an observer. I prefer to live with and work with the people I photograph and help to inspire and draw to the surface the true essence of their raw beauty and character as I see it. We participate together in that sense and magnify these qualities. After all, as you cannot truly separate the artist from the subject. They combine with each other to complete the artistic process. If people who view my images immediately start thinking, “wow who is the photographer?” I feel I have failed to produce a good image, for it did not have the power to stop their thinking mind and draw the viewer into the magic and mystery of the piece. I believe, therefore, that although as the photographer I am an integral part of the image, I should exist as a silent or invisible partner.