I’m not in my natural element
outside the city. Rural areas feel
almost like a foreign land.
That’s part of the fascination.

I’m away. Some six hours south of my usual stomping ground the narrow roads and bucolic pastures are idyllic—yet unsettling—another type of reality altogether.

I’m definitely out of my element. No traffic, no horns. No bodegas, no street life. Instead I see snakes, possums, goats, cattle, sheep, scraggly woods and farms that have seen a better day—a simpler, stripped down, more elementary form of life.

Armed with my camera, I’m waiting for these alien places to speak to me in the same way the city does. It’s hunting season. I’m wearing an orange vest and hat—the sound of nearby shotguns too close for comfort. I, too, am looking to shoot—hoping to spot images I’ll want to make my own.

Just as with the photographs I produce in New York, this new work represents a way to access the world around me and bring it to life for others.

The way I approach Away is similar to the way I shoot City Quiet—intuitively from the gut with no specific concept in mind. I simply meander here and there, trusting that eventually something I see will call out to me. It can be anything—an odd juxtaposition of light and shadow, an unexpected angle, something that can be described only as abstract expressionism (the artist: nature).

Despite the intriguing disparity in subject matter, when I’m shooting Away, I see the same serene beauty I’ve always found in the City Quiet side of New York.