I visited a Hindu temple in Kolkata, in 2014. The temple contained a statue of a holy man whom I never learned about; I don’t know a lot about Hinduism. Inside, I witnessed Pūjā, the Hindu practice of prayer. The ritual includes offering a deity flowers, fruits, foods, and incense in addition to conventional prayers. I noticed most of the people in the temple kept their eyes open as they prayed. In Hinduism is important to see, and to be seen by the gods and others in the community, the practice of Darśana.
Years ago I asked a Hindu friend of mine, a photographer, what he was working on. He told me he wasn’t making pictures for two years. Instead he was looking under rocks. He wanted to better appreciate what is real, tangible, and earthy.
Creation is a gift, a blessing from God. The beginning of Genesis amazes me with beauty, thoughtfulness, and care. The intricacies of the earth, where we live and move and have our being with God, were not accidental. The universe is too imaginatively profound, sensually excessive, and astonishingly well designed not to be appreciated.
These are portraits, celebrating the beginning, the first days of creation as described in Genesis. You were there; so was I.
In the beginning was the Spirit, the Creative Energy, the Wind, the Breath, the Word… the Word was with God and the Word was God.
The Genesis Prints are 17”x 17” archival inkjet prints on matte paper.