I use digital photography to explore the physical and cultural landscape of Greater Los Angeles, and, occasionally, of other nearby places.

My work has taken the form of multiple projects, each with its own narrative, point of view, and/or geographical focus.  Nevertheless, each of these projects has been shaped by my fascination with the large-scale cultural change that is being experienced in the region. 

My long-term photographic project has been to create urban “moments of seeing,” i.e., to provide feeling-intense images of everyday life in this change-filled era.

I have a moral point of view.  I want to provide images that encourage people to connect their experience of Los Angeles with reflections about civic culture and social justice. I do not want to promote a sour, moralistic mentality.  I  want people to recognize the humor they encounter daily on Los Angeles streets. Just as much, I want people to recognize that the Los Angeles metropolitan area is filled with beauty and energy, not just with violence, stressed traffic, multiethnic hostility, and other forms of ugliness.

There is a populist bent to my work. My lens often aims at people and structures whose presence is unwelcome--e.g., industrial buildings, eccentrics, homeless people, street scenes, strip malls, housing tracts, apartments, motels, and posters that are plastered on city walls. Urban life creates victims, outsiders, and structures-waiting-to-be-demolished.  Their profile tells us a great deal about Los Angeles metropolitan values.

There is one more habit that I should mention.  When I encounter unwelcome people and places, my romanticist impulses surge.  I search for ways of portraying them that emphasize their beauty.  I carefully consider matters related to composition. It is a serious mistake, I believe, to turn away from one’s immediate urban environment to seek beauty mainly in nature or in other sentimentalized non-urban settings.