Tom, 2009, 10×8 gelatin silver print
On Sunday, August 16, 2009 we went with writer Mike Perry to Tom’s farm. In the process of making photographs with our 8×10 view camera, Tom told the stories that belong to a lifelong collection of experiences and stuff. Posing for photographs altered the relationship with time. Infinite unrecorded moments contribute to the making of a single statement representing an impossibly complex evolution. Invention, persistence, deterioration, obsolescence, and wisdom accumulate on the surface where they were available to the camera. Our photographs, an extended portrait, are published in Visiting Tom: A Man, a Highway, and the Road to Roughneck Grace by Perry. Reviews and interviews about the book have been published in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, The Cap Times, OnMilwaukee.com, VolumeOne.org, and Boswell and Books blog. The book made The New York Times Book Review Best-Seller list in September 2012.