Campesino, Boyacá, Colombia 1975

Allison Lapper by Marc Quinn

Allison Lapper was born this way because of her mother taking Thalidomide during her pregnancy. A few years ago Marc Quinn, British artist won a contest to place his haunting marble sculpture atop the plinth in Trafalgar Square, a fitting homage to a woman, mother and working artist.

Looking Back and Then Some

                                                Haga Click en: Una Mirada Retrospectiva

Urban Landscape, Lisbon

Olivier Robert, 2003

This pictures were taken on my last visit to the US ten years ago. By this time Olivier's two boys, Julien and Thibault (with rabbit) were still young children. A lot has happened in the last twenty years but the friendship and affection remain unchanged across the Atlantic.

Olivier Robert and Lalo Borja by Paul Fusco

During our days at Gamma Labs in San Francisco in the early nineties, Olivier and I became acquainted with the much admired Magnum photographer Paul Fusco. One day Paul surprised both of us by asking if we had some time to look at a documentary of his, about terminally ill Aids sufferers living in an old hotel in the Tenderloin district.
In mid-June Paul showed up at my apartment on Potrero Hill, and we had some beers and had a chance to see his photographs and talk shop for a few hours.
A couple of weeks later, Paul very graciously handed me an envelope with at least a dozen signed shots which he had taken during the course of our conversation.

Couldn't Help Myself (I Had to Steal It)

This dreamy and tought-provoking image was posted in my dear friend Neil Sloman's blog and, I am not afraid to confess, I had to have it. The allure of it lays in its visually appealing composition, the undefined, not easily identifiably location and its almost impossible balance which renders it, to the viewer, as an extremely well-crafted and superbly framed scene. Geometry at its best, it lets us enjoy a photographer walking a finely-tuned tight rope, a string taut enough so that we can start to hear the melody.