Color and Light  

My passion as a photographer is to use light and reflection to to create depth of composition and unique perspective. I love to wander through new surroundings and familiar neighborhoods to find beauty in grand as well as ordinary vistas.  To capture a breathtaking composition is the challenge I love.  In this series, abstract Art is created with the simplicity of straight lines and a few angles. Color is an essential element in this work; it adds intensity and dimension.  Color, light and reflection unite to bring new vision and thought to ordinary walls and windows. 

Far from the Madding Crowd 

As a child growing up in a small town in Texas I dreamed of living on a farm surrounded by animals. In suburban Massachusetts a couple of years ago, I discovered that my fantasy farm exists just up the street. Visiting the farm I formed attachments with the animals and have made images in my style developed over the last decade. Concentrating on fine  detail not apparent to the naked eye, I find beauty in dirty faces and dripping saliva.     

 My images focus closely on individual animals. I capture their personalities and humanlike qualities – their questions, their curiosity, their wish for affection, and their offer of friendship  along with their ever powerful appetites. Ideally I hope my images might help lead to more humane treatment for these animal  such as advocated by Temple Grandin; and to a view of them as similar to our pets and worthy of being a “cause” like the prevention of cruelty to domestic animals. 

Seeking Glory 

Fame, success, even self-respect can be elusive goals for many young men (and women) who grow up in the inner city.  But the boxing gym, as it has for decades, promises a way up for some, a way out for others. It offers young boxers a home where they can find support and community.  It builds character.  For some it’s also the source of discipline needed to avoid the ever-present lure of gangs or drugs.  

I’ve been spending time at some of the inner-city gyms in the old mill towns north of Boston. I’ve gotten to know many of the boxers — and the trainers committed to them – and found them to possess an inner strength as well as a physical one. It takes both to step into the ring, to put the body through the punishment boxing demands, and to make the sacrifices needed to achieve a few moments of glory.  

These images – the beginning of a long-term project that will explore the lives of these boxers more deeply – celebrate the strength and courage it takes to be a boxer. 

Brink of Change 

It was time to make a change, one of many turns in life – we wanted to leave New England winters behind. How does one find a new place, step from the familiar to the new? 

Poised on the brink of a change, I awoke almost daily with a new fear, yet another way it could go wrong. What if…  

These photographs emerged as little postcards from sleep-born anxieties. They look at me and say, this is what you fear. Recognize it. It will all work out. 

Christina’s Home

This is the home of Christina Olson who is the subject of Andrew Wyeth’s painting, “Christina’s World”.   Christina is shown laying in a field looking up at the house.  These photographs are an exploration of light and space in her home.  Although light and space are around us all the time, this historic house offered a rare opportunity.   These photographs of lightly furnished rooms with their long rambling corridors present mysterious hints of the presence of other rooms.  This leaves the viewer’s imagination to explore them.  The unfinished floors and paint peeling off the walls added texture to the halls and rooms.  I am drawn to the elements of light, space and texture.  They are the subject of many of my photographs.  

Christina suffered from muscular dystrophy which was a progressive disease that left her without the use of her legs.  She chose to crawl through the 14 room farmhouse rather than use a wheel chair. One can only imagine what life was like for Christina.     

Without You 

My husband passed away a few years ago. People didn’t know what to say. My own words weren’t enough. In time, I picked up my camera and went on long walks and hikes. I found scenes that reflected my sadness, sense of isolation, and grief. In their own way, these glimpses offered comfort. 

Poet Marie Howe has said, “Art helps us let our hearts break open rather than close.” These images, and the act of sharing them with you, help let my heart keep breaking open. 

La Familia

As an Italian-American I have learned that the family is the most important aspect of life and that family should always come first. Throughout my photographs I explore the love, support and tradition my own Sicilian family has taught me. The images exhibited are from different family holidays and gatherings over the year and demonstrate the ways in which we celebrate. My motivation for this series is to represent the positive effect spending time with one’s family can have on them. Coming from a big family there are many different, big personalities, but the dynamic is what makes the gatherings interesting. We are all diverse and we learn from each other, one minute we fight, the next minute we get coffee, we stick together and grow as a unit.

This body of work is dedicated to my family because as I grow older I realize how lucky I am to have this constant support system to fall back on. I realize that some people have not had the ability to grow up how I have so my work is to encourage others to reach out to that family member they have not talked to in years, or to try to make time to spend with one’s family, because for me at least, in the end, the family is all that matters.

The Spoken Word

Each photograph in the Spoken Word project is meant to be a visual open mike, an individual reflection of the poetry community in the Boston area. This is an exceptional community of people in part due to its diversity and the sincere respect they have for each other, all of which translates into an undeniable strength.

The Boston poetry community comes together at least three to four times a week to listen and support each other through their spoken word art, a mix of poetry and performance, and sometimes song. People are not at all hesitant to personally address topics normally avoided by society at large, saying what they mean and meaning what they say.

The project is a direct collaboration with Boston area poets and spoken word artists. My approach to this series of environmental portraits is developed together with the subject based on the poet’s work and their personal style of expression. The prints are then finished with a fragment of their work or an entire poem handwritten directly onto the photograph creating an individual testament to our collaboration.

Every time I work with a new person, I find that I’m a new person as a result. It never gets old.

After Hours

Perhaps it is my age but I long for many of the elements of our past. When we give up our small downtown business districts we lose the local shops, their proprietors and a venue to maintain connections with our neighbors. Big Box Retail and On-Line shopping is no substitute for more personal commerce. Our central business districts were a center of community life and activity. When people lived downtown there was a different vitality of entire town. As the lights went in the stores each they came on in the apartments above. Today, so many of those units remain vacant. Even after restaurants and pubs closed there were always signs of life.

Today, across the country, small town central business districts are failing. They are an endangered species. Small downtowns thrive in tourist destinations, where outside money flows in during the High Season and survive for the benefit of The Townies. Off season inhabitants are so much more interesting and colorful. They are the town. Off season and nights are my favorite times to visit such places. Shop windows are lit showing off a variety of wares, chairs stacked on tables in restaurants and signs welcoming customers back tomorrow hang in all the windows.

These images were taken long After Hours in both Maine and Massachusetts. I have tried to show the quiet loneliness of the nights and early mornings and the signs of the little remaining life after hours. I hope that people will once again return to small neighborhood business districts, appreciate the value of small town life and the connection with artists, vendors, professionals and neighbors.