Salsa
Salsa dance comes from centuries of blending of rhythms and dances from Cuba, the Caribbean, and from African slaves. People from all cultures now dance Salsa. If you can hear and feel the soul of Latin music, then you can learn Salsa. If you can walk to the 4/4 rhythms, you can learn Salsa. Hear the music, move with, feel your partner, improvise – now you’re dancing Salsa.
I’m photographing in Salsa clubs in New York City and Brooklyn. I am interested in the partnering and respect the dancers have for one another. Frequently, the partners are unknown to each other, but share a common love of Salsa. One asks another to dance, and they begin. Over the course of the evening, each dancer may dance with several partners. In Salsa, the man is the lead dancer. The woman responds to his lead. Yet in the upbeat tempo of the dance, the couple moves as one.
I have been impressed with how the dancer’s movements demonstrate a care and tenderness shared between strangers. Unlike the ambiguity of social contact in the broader culture, the set movements of the dance provide rules for the interaction. The clubs are a safe, diverse, and a joyous community of people who come together through their love of Salsa.
Walls
I have walked and explored the woods behind my house in the Town of Cortlandt, New York for years. I’m intrigued by the dry stone walls that meander through and crisscross the woods there. From glacial rubble each stone was placed by human effort, and each still holds that story.
They are history, originally placed with balanced resistance, at one time new and of a purpose, mounds made by the Kitchawanc Tribe as early as 4950 BC, barriers made during the Revolutionary War, walls assembled by the slaves of Stephanus Van Cortlandt at the end of the 17th century, and formed stone structures made by the Dutch and English Quaker farmers in the early 18th century. These stone sculptures continue to record time in textured wear. They continue to zig zag, curve, and undulate over the hills.
My photographs capture what I feel when I walk this open space and contemplate the origin of these structures, their being, the mystery and fantasy they impart to the woods, and the joyous power and inspiration they impart to me.
This is a unique geological area. These are artifacts that have stood up to neglect. They merit preservation and hopefully my photographs will inspire more interest in these remnants of lost time.
Meatpacking
I arrived in the West Village in the mid seventies, a modern dancer, on scholarship with Merce Cunningham. I performed at the dance space in Westbeth. I climbed out the second floor window to access the elevated railroad track, abandoned to weeds and wild flowers, now the High Line. Every day I walked the cobblestone streets of the Meatpacking District to rehearse in a loft space on Gansevoort Street. In the summers, we opened the windows to the smell of blood and raw meat that mixed with our own smell of sweat. I shopped there, by the loading docks with racks and racks of hanging beef and pig carcasses, calling out for the butchers, in their blood splattered white coats. I jogged through the district, passed the gay sex clubs, and out onto the wooden piers, till all the characters became familiar — the squeegee guys, the transvestite prostitutes, the drug dealers, and the addicts.
I retired as a dancer. I don’t perform any more, but I still live on the West Village stage.
I began taking my camera with me on daily walks through the West Village. Initially holding the camera and shooting felt awkward. It was very different from being a dancer. However, when shooting the Meatpacking District, I could feel the camera as an extension of my body rather than a barrier. The elements of movement: time, shape, space, and effort — are all inherent in how I see the world. I realized that these familiar elements also applied to photography. My body was my expressive art; now my choreography has morphed into my camera and is saved in my photographs.
This project, shooting the Meatpacking District, came from a need to document it. I returned there many times over months. At first, the workers were wary, but with repetition, they let me in. One of the butchers dared me to come at three am to really see the place. I did, and it became a special time to shoot: the florescent light in the dark, the dawn, then the morning light.
The Meatpacking District is now very chic with quaint clean cobblestone streets, night clubs, high end boutiques, and home to the Whitney Museum. The buildings there are now New York City Landmarked. What in the 1970s’ spanned nine blocks, is now contained in one. The slaughter houses are long gone; the meat racks, the butchers, and the truckers will also disappear.
Last Days of Barnum and Bailey
In May 2017, after 146 years, the greatest show on earth went dark forever. The circus, the Ringling Brothers Barnum Bailey Circus just wasn’t right for the times.
Saddened to hear this, I committed to photographing the last performances at Barclay Center in Brooklyn and at the Nassau Coliseum in Uniondale, New York. The circus held a special place in our heart, in our childhood dreams of running away with the clowns and the trapeze artists. We didn’t want it to end.
I embrace the photographic techniques of line, shape, depth, rhythm, and intentional blur. The clowns cross the ring in frantic intent. The lion tamer flicks his whip. The horses’ rhythmic prance anticipates the gallop. The trapeze artists flip and fly above the crowd. Seeing it all at once, moving to an angle, shooting, deliberate, I finally feel one with the performers.
The nostalgia is palpable during these last nights, and nostalgia brings focus to this shoot. The big top, the ring, the painted smiles, the pulsing energy in the moment, in the photograph, is eternal. My lens sought to capture the connection between the stark reality of the end of an epoch and the enduring fantasy of a child. And to document the final days of the Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus for now and forever.
Echos of Change
Growing up through the 1960’s, I protested, I marched, against the Viet Nam war, for women’s rights and Planned Parenthood.
Today in New York City collective voices fill the streets with emotion, ideals, and demands. "Echoes of Change" is a visual journey capturing the rawness of the demonstrations that have swept through the city. This body of work seeks to capture the social consciousness and the persistent quest for freedom that defines our time.
A venture into these demonstrations, I aim to encapsulate the energy, unity, and diversity of the participants. My photos offer an intimate look at the faces that drive these movements. I strive to not just document the moment, but the power of collective action and the historical momentum.
Each photograph in "Echoes of Change" tells a tale of individuals refusing to be silenced, the impassioned speeches, the vibrant signs, banners, chants and cheers, the introspective moments and the tears, through the interplay of light and shadow, color and composition.
I offer "Echoes of Change" as a testament to the power of unity, the strength of conviction, and the enduring human spirit. These images stand as a reminder that the streets hold the stories of a city, and the city holds the stories of humanity. It is my hope that this collection adds to the cannon of photography that immortalize demonstrations of the past, to inspire a continued dialogue for positive change.
I am not alone. I can resist. I can speak out. I will not be silenced.