Stewart Street (UC Sawtelle) Santa Monica 1995

This photo, Stewart Street, Santa Monica, was taken by Madoka Takagi, who was working with the world as she found it. Takagi’s palette here is wonderfully subdued, just the scale of grays that a sheet of photographic paper can yield. The subject matter is of course telling, a row of trailer homes that seem both permanent and impermanent. I'm drawn to the shadows in the photograph and to the way the artist emphasizes the wires running between the telegraph poles. They create an irregular rhythm, echoing the more solid forms below. This feels like a piece about light, and how light both reveals and obscures. Artists like Ed Ruscha and Bernd and Hilla Becher come to mind, artists interested in the documentary, and in the poetry of the everyday. It’s all about seeing, and allowing yourself to be changed by what you see.