Featured Photographer: Mark Alor Powell
Brilliant digital photography from Detroit and Mexico City
Editor’s note: This is part of an ongoing monthly series in which we showcase the work of an artist we admire.
Mark Alor Powell’s photography is full of some of the most intriguing characters and stories you’ll find anywhere.
His ability to quickly build relationships with his subjects is uncanny. Instead of trying to sneak off a couple of shots before they notice, he gets right in the middle of their lives and captures them in a vivid and emotional way. He’s taught himself how to quickly earn trust and become part of the action, and the sense of adventure comes out in his work.
It’s almost frustrating to look through his work, simply because you’ll be haunted by the need to know the real stories behind the photos. Instead, the photos remain untitled and unexplained, leaving it up to the imagination.
2point8, the great street photography blog, posted an interview with Mark earlier in the year, which offered some excellent insights into his approach:
I try to make people feel good about themselves. I like to tell little white lies to get into situations, using compliments and stuff. I just try to make people feel comfortable. I use anything to keep the focus off being photographed. I’ll tell people that I love their necklace or their shirt, or the painting on their wall, or say I got a pet just like theirs, or tell them about my uncle back home, I got to take a picture for my uncle, please, he has to see this. I’ve found that when a picture is meant for someone else, people seem to think it is all right for you to take it. Recently, I’ve been answering ads in classified listings and pretending to buy whatever they are selling, just to get inside places that would be impossible to discover otherwise.
More of Mark Alor Powell’s work can be found at the following sites:
- http://www.markalor.com/
- http://www.markalor.com/daypops/
- http://www.markalor.com/daypops/
- http://www.fotolog.com/location_iceburg
- http://jpgmag.com/issue2.html
Some highlights of Mark’s work:
