What is it like for an American photographer working in Paris?
When there is a scene I would like to photograph without disturbing the action, I keep the camera at waist-level and don t use the viewfinder. If the scene is especially delicate, I don t look at my subject, or even turn toward them. In this mode, photography becomes a visceral activity. My hands and forearms, connecting the camera to the rest of my body, become the viewfinder, another sort of peripheral vision another eyes. The photographs that come out of this work have a spontaneous feel, a physicality. They are taken, literally, at gut level and reflect that to the viewer. I have been taking pictures in this manner (when the occasion requires it) for over a decade. I have become used to switching into this mode when putting a camera in front of my face would ruin a picture, and I ve become used to obtaining my desired results. While visiting Paris for ten days in the spring of 1996, I used my standard techniques for taking candid pictures. After returning home to Boston, Massachuse
