<p>WE is a confessional about my two life-long love affairs: one with black and white photography and the other with the human race. The first part, The Soviets, contains the photographs taken before my immigration to the US in 1978. The New Yorkers and The World photographs were taken after it, mostly in the 1980s. In retrospect, it was both my photography and my curiosity about people that led me to become a psychiatrist. This role gave me the privilege of stepping inside people’s personal spaces at the times when they are the most vulnerable. Over the years, I did so with thousands of people, which made me realize how similar we all are. This book is called WE because I am included. I can’t explain this connection any better than I did on my photography website, drgalynkerphotography.com: I am a psychiatrist in my other life, where my first goal is to connect. Doing so may not be comfortable, but it is something that must be done. Otherwise, I will not be able to accomplish my second goal, which is to understand and accept the people I treat for who they are rather than who they may want to appear to be. What I encounter most is pain, but also beauty. Seeing beauty helps me heal the pain - which is my third and final goal. When I photograph strangers, I echo as a street photographer what I do as a psychiatrist. First I aim to connect, which can be done in an instant in the street. My second aim is to capture an image of a person as they really are rather than who they may want to appear to be. When taking the photograph I try to make eye contact. If this is not possible for some reason, I focus on gestures and clothes, which can be as expressive and revealing as people’s eyes. My final aim in photography is to preserve human beauty in all its non-trivial forms. David Byrne once said “It is the pain that keeps us alive but that beauty is all that we need to survive.” I hope that the beauty in my images helps the survival part – the viewer’s, the subject’s, and mine</p>

Igor Galynker

Passage Press

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Books by Igor Galynker

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Igor Galynker. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

WE