Introduction

REFLECTION ON THE PORTRAITS….

Human suffering seems to run along a variety of continuums.  There is pain which we endure that transforms us, still other things leave us deformed.

There is suffering so mysterious and interwoven with our existence that we give up identifying the sensation as painful.  There is sorrow that we feel could have been prevented, and injury which makes us feel so powerless that e endure it in secret and silence.  There are times when our silence seems to help us, other times we are undone by the selfsame silence, becoming invisible to others and over selves.

To see clearly what we endure in silence, it is necessary to recount what we inflict in secret.  If it is done honestly, and conscientiously, the astonishing invisible appears.  From that place the individual comes forth, recounting for all others what it was like to be human at that time and moment.  With that accomplishment we reclaim some of what we have lost, and take back some of what has been taken from us.

Michael Steven Doller