GAZE…….An extension of the heart

Photographs pinned to my studio wall provide what the glance of an eye cannot….a porthole into the past, to more fully understand the present, and an inspiration for meditations, fantasies. Although the range of possible subject matter is infinite, spanning the microscopic to the cosmic, I chose to limit my subject to eye-engaging men from various occupations. It’s a way to have a conversation with them. What are they silently saying?

Drawing conveys an emotional quality, a feel beyond the capture of a camera lens. From prehistoric marks on cave walls to graffiti on cement walls, erasures and blending on paper, the hand charges an image with energy, beauty or ugliness. The human gaze is the extension of the heart and mind. The face can gape, glare, and gloat. Emotions filter through a face.

I remember a moment in the 1960s when tracking the progress of Senator Bobby Kennedy through my viewfinder; I instantly clicked, made an image of the man. He had been only two feet away from me and I realized only later that I had just missed seeing him face to face. It is through drawing, from the photograph or from memory, that the intimate moment is recaptured.

Once, walking on 42nd Street in New York City, people rushing by me on all sides, their eyes on the ground, I looked up and saw, about one-half block away, a man wearing sunglasses who seemed looking at me. I whispered to my companion, “He must be a secret agent or an artist!” Now, if I intuitively sense a momentous or even tiny trail of light, I gaze back with open heart, open eyes.