"somber people and black events quiet people and peaceful events and the things people have come in contact with this, I try to show in my photographs"

Robert Frank

We are all actors of our own lives. We are all vulnerable. We are all heroic. We are human beings. Therein lies the wonder. The passions, strengths, weaknesses, joy, innocence, sadness, violence, tragedy and the multitude of contradictions that constitute a person are what I believe make men and women so ‘beautiful’. That is why I try to get in close and photograph their eyes - -eyes that observe me watching them. It is as though they are briefly opening their souls and I am allowed in to capture a fraction. Through this action, capturing the moment, I may be also be making sense, albeit briefly, of their persona - -as well as mine.

John Pepper
Roma, 2011