Visual Storytelling
Visual narratives exploring memory, identity, community, resilience, and the human experience through photography and documentary storytelling.
Egypt Everyday
Egypt the place is filled with wonders seen nowhere else on earth. A true starting point of civilization. Egypt gives the feel of going back in time, like being in one of those tapestries filled with palm trees and turbans. But it also is modern, so to be a visitor, I am left standing unsure of where I am in time and space. Egypt is a place that carries on in the shadow of its ancient majesty. Here shows a little of the lives of people now and how a society carries forward.
Night Scenes Project
Outside Looking In – The night reveals what is inside. There is a beauty seeing inward and a grace in the mundane. On the outside encased in darkness, we get glimmers of light, an intimacy to someone’s private world. The motivation is not to be voyeur, but share a moment without barriers and connect. Many of these images were taken before the pandemic, yet they are more relevant than ever. Not so much about isolation, they convey internalization. During this time, we have all had to stay within our shell and while being distant from others, become close to ourselves. In looking from the outside through the night everything changes, colors are different, new shapes stand out, and though it is harder to see in the dark, things once obscured now become apparent and tell their story.
Worchester Asylum
These collages combine photographs taken at the abandoned Worcester State Mental Hospital in Massachusetts and glass plate images of its patients. At one time, the hospital had been a self-sufficient institution, housing thousands of patients including children. Almost one hundred years later the Asylum closed down as if in a hurry, leaving behind treatment equipment, case files, and the unsettled phantoms of the patients who stayed there.
This project tells the story of mental illness and also of individuals, imprisoned, ostracized, and abused by a culture who labeled them not with an illness but as an illness. Some were merely sent to the asylum for being outspoken, others were imprisoned for being from another country or because they were women.
The collage uses discarded glass plate images of patients from Worcester Insane Asylum. They were combined with my own photographs of the abandoned hospital.
Most of the collages were created by placing the glass plates, sight unseen, directly onto the photographic paper in the darkroom. The resulting image was as if the patients were narrating their story – ghosts whispering their tale.
Kilby Street
Kilby Street is considered the toughest in Worcester. Known for drugs, prostitution and gangs, the people living there struggle to distance themselves from all that. They are people who are overlooked – unseen. Yet each person on Kilby has a story. A full life crammed in a one room apartment. Every day for them is a work of struggle and poetry. Walking around the block faces appear and disappear, smiles from some, averted eyes from others. The stories continue. Graffiti and lawn Madonna’s welcome all who come to Kilby Street.
The Street Peace Project
The Memorials
The Street Peace Project - The Memorials, is about how a neighborhood, my neighborhood, tries to heal from so much violence. I have lived here for 30 years, and especially in the past few years, there has been a lot of deadly crime only blocks away from my home. Most of the victims are under the age of 20. Our families and friends have set up street memorials to express their love and honor those who have been killed. As a photographer, I started photographing the memorials in my neighborhood to give them lasting tribute. The project has shown how much people want to be positive and supportive of each other and where we live. The memorials have taught me how to not dwell on tragedy, rather celebrate the love.
Eccletic Collections
An evolving collection of creative works, found objects, visual pieces, stories, and artistic explorations that reflect curiosity, memory, culture, and the beauty of human expression in all its forms.