La Parthenopea

If reincarnation were really, surely at least one of my past lives would have been lived out under the blistering Neapolitan sun. Naples has been one of my happy places since my first visit at 20. It is frenetic and filthy and often dangerous and I love every part of it. I'm not certain what it says about me that I thrive in chaos.

At least, I think I thrive in chaos.

In that spirit, I kicked off my trip not in the reasonable starting cities of Milan or Rome, but instead my beloved Napoli. It meant an extra layover (hence, Madrid!), and a whole layer of complication to meet up with my parents in Umbria. I arrived at 23:00 and was scheduled for the 13:00 train for Roma Termini; in my mind, this was clearly a sufficient amount of time to wander my favorite streets and stop for a meal at the oh-so-touristy but equally delicious Antica Pizzeria da Michele.

So I thought.

I woke up late with a headache to boot and didn't get out the door until 10. Naturally, the street I thought I wanted to take (and found without map nor problem) wasn't the street I actually needed to take, which lead to me furiously power-walking down Spaccannapoli muttering "shcusate" in my best imitation of dialetto and arriving at the restaurant (where a line was already assembled) at five to 11. 

My saving grace? Solo travel! The place is always so crowded that you get a ticket on arrival and wait until your number is called. It can be hours if you time things badly. The man giving out the tickets was asking how many were in each group and I hollered out, "una!" when he came to me. "Are you alone?" he asked. "Si, sono da sola - I am alone!" I responded back in Italian, hoping that would help my case. Lo and behold, I was not only seated, but got the first pizza coming out of the oven. I left twenty minutes later, full as an egg and inordinately pleased with myself.

The other complication of the morning was the fact that while I had brought along the DSR and an extra lens and planned my shooting around the direction of the sun, I had forgotten to replace the memory card. There's nothing like lugging a heavy bag of effectively useless camera gear to pay penance for your stupidity. And so, instead of rim-lit portraits of Napolitani going about their mornings, iPhone shots. So it goes.

Barajas y el infinito

An appreciation for airport architecture is a fine thing for a constant traveler to develop. Learning to appreciate the beauty in angles, curves, light, impact - the specific visual language and the visceral feeling of place. The ability to experience moments of solitude, calm, or delight in an otherwise hectic environment never goes unnoticed.

El Aeropuerto Adolfo Suárez Madrid-Barajas is easily a masterwork - clean, airy spaces to diminish inklings of claustrophobia; graceful, swooping curves and warm golden wood to drive out the sense of the clinical; playful and practical dashes of color to draw in the eye and give weary travelers an idea of how much farther they have to walk.

While the building could easily lend itself to moody monochromatic abstract detail shots, it seems a crime to eschew its color and not celebrate it as it is.

(My favorite airport in Europe.)

Snakes + Funerals

In Mexico City (and in returning from Mexico City), I felt an urgency to create. A rush of frustrated energy. A rebirth of a part of my soul I'd thought I'd lost for good.

(No one said I wasn't dramatic.)

I returned to digital photography in the latter half of 2014 for purely documentary purposes. Film stocks were vanishing right and left, and I'd moved 2,500 miles from my C-41 lab, just to add a layer of complication. It never felt quite like art. It still feels like studio work or stock.

Digital photography without introspection, without focus, and without process is easily soulless. Sterile, perfect, real images of real things. In truth, the medium is limited only in what you allow yourself to do with it, and adherence to supposed orthodoxy seems unnecessary at a time when producing any work is a struggle itself.

In seeking satisfaction for these urges, this energy, I thought – for whatever reason – of Fritz Lang in Le mépris giving his commentary on CinemaScope and went instantly to that aspect ratio. And much to my surprise, it worked. It worked for crowds. It worked for small, self-contained scenes. It worked for the lush tableaus of the Icelandic countryside, to the surprise of no one. Had the opportunity presented itself, I’ve no doubt it would have worked for snakes – and funerals.

You can take a look at the full gallery below or here.