PRAXIS GALLERY PHOTO ARTS CENTER
Untitled from my Introspection series, 2020, Renato Rampolla
This piece is now in the permanent collection of Praxis Gallery Photo Arts Center in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
MICHAEL S.: More importantly, Michael is the subject in this image. I met him four years ago. He was a low-functioning alcoholic who lived outdoors. Trained as a land surveyor, he obviously was not always low-functioning. I featured his portrait in my book Dignity No Matter What: The Light Within, which featured the homeless and their stories. (Net proceeds went to a local homeless charity.) We discussed different options to change his life and he said he even has family in town. However, he was content.
Michael was well over six foot tall and mild mannered. Conversing with him back in 2017, I sometimes got a glimpse of whom he once was. Perhaps, a spark that might be kindled. But, addiction was weighing him down like a huge wooden cross on his back and he couldn’t seem to get from under it. Even worse, he didn’t seem to want to get from under it. Recently, I saw one of his friends and he told me that Michael is still about the same four years later.
CUMULATIVE EFFECT: With my INTROSPECTION series, I want to make more that just a portrait. My portraits convey the emotion of being there as a moment in time. But what about after that? How does the cumulative effect of making all of these portraits of people living on the streets affect me? How do my past experiences affect the way I see the world? I want to convey that, but I can’t seem to find the words. Edward Hopper said, “If I could say it in words, I wouldn’t need to paint.”
This is what my INTROSPECTION series is about. Those feelings deep inside that are often difficult to isolate and put into words but you know they are there.
As a whole, my works are concerned not only with the dignity of the homeless, but with all of humanity and our fundamental human needs of belonging, dignity, survival, loneliness, belief in something bigger than ourselves, love and kindness. In short, my images are concerned with our human condition.
