CERTAIN PLACES

Feelings of connectedness and ascendancy, anticipation and a little dread, unexpectedly come over me when I find myself in a certain type of place. I love, live for, these energizing feelings. Intuition determines if a given locale is special or just another vacant lot. The right place drives the tedium from my mind and sends me racing into a world of imagination and possibility.

Intuition and memory profoundly shaped my experience of place. The genesis of this series began on childhood vacations, as my family crisscrossed the west in our station wagon on long summer road trips. The view through the backseat window became my portal into a world of imagination and possibility, where time stood still as the vast open spaces slid by in stop motion, framed like natural dioramas. When we stopped, I’d climb out of the car, walk into the desert and sit where I could touch the rocks and feel the emptiness. The tiniest detail brought the limitless space into sharp focus, pushing me to discover what was happening ahead, hidden beyond the horizon; beautiful empty places that I knew could reveal secrets.

While the places I document hold personal significance, representing the identifiable location is unimportant. These are portraits of the evocative feelings and emotions that overcome me; an invitation to go where the past coexists with the present, uncertainty mingles with anticipation, and the familiar delivers the unexpected.