Writing on Almost Naked

A few months ago, I got contacted by writer Marc Nieson for getting permission to write some of my portraits from Almost Naked, creatively not critically. Marc Nieson is a novelist and a screenwriter who won Special Jury Prize at the 2007 Venice Film Festival for his screenplay The Speed of Life, he also teaches at Chatham University for the MFA Creative Writing.

The writing on my work is initially commissioned by Silver Eye Center for Photography and Sherrie Flick as part of their "Point of View" programming. Here is two pieces of wonderful writing on two of my portraits. I am truly honored and love the pieces. It is refreshing to read stories of the pictures I have made, they stirs my memory a little bit.

The Pomegranate

So, what should I say?

One day even this will embarrass you, no
doubt. My dress, thick as drawing room
curtains yet just as revealing, your school
uniform with its creases of confusion. All like
some tapestry. Some tableau.

Perhaps Hamlet said it best — words, words,
words. Sumptuous, forbidden, divulge,
indulge. I’ll spare you the seasons of details.
Mostly, it’s not what you think. Let alone what
you’d ask. Of your father, you already know. At
least what’s felt necessary. Perhaps I’ve been
wrong to say so little. Certainly it’s ripe for that
talk too, but not today. All in due moments, I
promise.

The world is often halved. Our eyes typically
reveal less than our gestures. It’s all a pose. A
drama. Take note of the frame.

What else? Yes, take a big bite.There are many
seeds.

Room Service

That’s all I really wanted. Someplace warm for
the night. A room with a number, and tiny
mints on each pillow. Bible in the drawer.
Doesn’t seem so much to ask for, at least
tonight. Or that shoe store up the block with
the $10 sale. They’ll open at noon.

Outside it’s raining, not that you can tell. High
school was so easy, eight periods a day. Now
I’m between beds with this ocean in my head.
Still feeling kind of queasy. Footsteps next
door. They make it all sound so simple.
Directions you can follow written on the wall.
Do not disturb. Leave the towels on the floor.
In case of emergency, head for the stairs.

And in the morning it’s the maids who’ll come
knocking. They’ll clean up your mess, then roll
down the hall. I won’t speak their language,
won’t know from where they came. Maybe
they’ve got infants at home, maybe not. Maybe
I won’t go to hell.

-Marc Nieson