Chapter 1 — Why Photography?

Why do we choose to take photographs? What is it about a photograph that draws us so? Why pick up a camera at all?

I do photography because it’s the best way I know to express myself. Expressing myself is not the most important thing in the world, I suppose.

I didn’t choose photography at first. I chose words. As a teenager I was obsessed with books and with writers like Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg. I’d found Kerouac’s novel “On the Road” in a second-hand bookstore. I became a Kerouac fanatic even before I finished reading the book. I was drawn to their lives and their adventures; I was captivated by the idea of writers road-tripping across America, smoking cigarettes and chugging beer and writing stream-of-consciousness poetry.

When I look back, I think it’s only because I thought my life was boring. I wanted adventure in my own life, so I decided to live in a fantasy world.